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Intoxication caused by new psychostimulants: analytical methods to disclose acute and chronic use of benzofurans and ethylphenidate

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Abstract

The acute and chronic toxicity of several new psychoactive substances (NPS) is unknown, and only little information is available on the pharmacology and toxicology, toxicokinetics, and detectability in body samples of such new compounds. We here propose analytical methods to disclose acute and chronic use of two types of new psychostimulants: benzofurans and ethylphenidate and we applied them to a real case of a subject attending Emergency Department with signs of acute intoxication due to psychotropic drug(s). After a urinary immunoassay screening which gave a positivity to amphetamines, general unknown gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) urine analysis identified 5-(2-methylaminopropyl)benzofuran (5-MAPB), 5-(2-aminopropyl)benzofuran (5-APB), 5-(2-ethylaminopropyl)benzofuran (5-EAPB), ethylphenidate, and ritalinic acid. All these substances were confirmed and quantified not only in urine but also in serum samples at different times after hospitalization by GC-MS and ultra-high performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS). Two subsequent 2-cm hair segments were also analyzed and tested positive for the above reported substances, evidencing repeated use. The matching quantitative results in all the analyzed biological matrices demonstrated that both analytical methodologies were suitable to correctly quantify NPS involved in the current intoxication. The objective assessment of acute and chronic intoxication by the above reported compounds demonstrate that the development of analytical methods aiming at the detection of a broad spectrum of compounds in conventional and non-conventional biological matrices is helpful when facing the new challenging threat of intoxications caused by NPS.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Michele Sciotti, Simonetta di Carlo e Antonella Bacosi, and Sonia Avella for the technical assistance and Virgili Paez and his working team from the virtual Health Sciences Library of the Balearic Islands (Bibliosalut) for the technical assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Clinical Toxicology Unit, Clinical Analysis Department, Hospital Universitari Son Espases, Research Institute of Health Sciences (IdISBa), Palma de Mallorca, Spain

    Bernardino Barceló, Isabel Gomila & Miguel Ángel Elorza

  2. National Centre On Addiction And Doping, Istituto Superiore di Sanità, Rome, Italy

    Maria Concetta Rotolo, Emilia Marchei & Simona Pichini

  3. Unit of Forensic Toxicology (UoFT), Department of Anatomical, Histological, Forensic and Orthopedic Sciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena, 336, Rome, Italy

    Chrystalla Kyriakou & Francesco Paolo Busardò

  4. Department of Psychiatry, Hospital Universitari Son Espases, Palma de Mallorca, Spain

    Carolina Roset

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  1. Bernardino Barceló
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  2. Isabel Gomila
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  3. Maria Concetta Rotolo
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  4. Emilia Marchei
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  5. Chrystalla Kyriakou
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  8. Miguel Ángel Elorza
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  9. Francesco Paolo Busardò
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Correspondence to Francesco Paolo Busardò.

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This work was supported in part by a grant from the Fondo de Investigación Sanitaria (PI15/00251), Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia, Spain.

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Barceló, B., Gomila, I., Rotolo, M.C. et al. Intoxication caused by new psychostimulants: analytical methods to disclose acute and chronic use of benzofurans and ethylphenidate. Int J Legal Med 131, 1543–1553 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00414-017-1648-9

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