title: Evaluation of the Syva ETS-PLUS Ethyl Alcohol Assay with application to the analysis of antemortem whole blood, routine postmortem specimens, and synovial fluid.
abstract: A critical evaluation of the ETS-PLUS Ethyl Alcohol Assay indicates that it is simple to perform, sensitive enough to reliably detect ethanol above a concentration of 0.010 g/dL, and dynamic enough to reliably quantitate ethanol concentrations between 0.010 and 0.400 g/dL, correlating well with headspace gas chromatography. The technique is suitable for the analysis of relatively fresh (less than 1 month old) serum, plasma, urine, bile, vitreous humor, and gastric samples. With the aid of dilution, it is adaptable to the analysis of whole blood, relatively old specimens (more than 3 months old), viscous and highly pigmented plasma, bile, and the occasional extremely viscous vitreous humor specimens. Our evaluation further indicates that samples can remain in the system's covered sample wheel for up to 2 h without significant (less than 10%) diminution in ethanol concentration. This technique was further utilized to evaluate the suitability of synovial fluid as an alternative for vitreous humor.
authors.affiliation: Cuyahoga County Coroner's Office, Cleveland, Ohio 44106.
authors.forename: C A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Sutheimer
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Lavins
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: King
mesh_terms: D000431:Ethanol / Q000032:analysis* / Q000097:blood; D005554:Forensic Medicine; D006801:Humans; D013048:Specimen Handling; D013582:Synovial Fluid / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D000431:Ethanol