Postmortem Toxicology of Abused Drugs (Relié)

Postmortem Toxicology of Abused Drugs considers the role of toxicology in the investigation of homicide, suicide, accident, natural death, and overdose. It gives practical insights and case reviews on conducting toxicology tests and completing toxicology reports. It explains chain of custody ; specimen collection and security ; sampling of blood, urine, bile, and vitreous humor ; and the selection of post-mortem specimens.
Analyzing various testing procedures, the book covers simple chemical tests, microdiffusion tests, chromatography, spectroscopy, and more. It also discusses methods and strategies for analysis ; and covers quality assurance protocols and controls. To help avoid common pitfalls, the text demonstrates the proper interpretation of postmortem drug levels based on knowledge of pharmacokinetics, metabolism, and pharmacogenetics ; post-mortem redistribution and diffusion ; and other considerations such as synergistic toxicity, and drug instability.
Features : introduces 50 original tables of drug information ; extensive references support the text ; offers up-to-date information in tabular format for ease of use ; contains a glossary, common abbreviations, and sample calculations.