Instrumental analysis to prevent overlooking drugs in forensic autopsies of fire and drowning cases

Abstract

This study focuses on fire and water cases that were subjected to forensic autopsies at Hiroshima University. It aimed to compare the results of rapid urinary drug screening kits with those obtained by instrumental analysis and evaluate the usefulness of instrumental analysis. This study included 102 fire and 64 water cases. False positives due to putrefactive amines were confirmed in stimulant tests in four fire cases and 18 water cases. In addition, although this did not result in a false-positive judgment for benzodiazepines, many benzodiazepines and their metabolites in the nine fire and four water cases were identified to be below the cutoff value. Moreover, prescription and over-the-counter drugs that did not show positive on rapid urinary drug screening kits were detected in fire and water cases, and drug concentrations in the blood reached toxic and lethal levels in three cases. The results of this study confirmed false positives and false negatives, and that there are many drugs that cannot be detected using rapid urinary drug screening kits. Although analytical instruments are expensive and require some specialized operators, its ability to detect a far greater variety of substances than rapid urinary drug screening kits makes it invaluable. In the future, drug testing using equipment should become more widespread in forensic science laboratories.