Morphine concentrations in skeletal muscle.
Skeletal muscle constitutes a large percentage of the total body volume, making it a potentially widely available specimen for drug quantitation when blood is not available for toxicological testing. Morphine is a commonly encountered opiate in postmortem toxicology known to have stable blood concentrations in peripheral vessels. Morphine concentrations were measured in both femoral blood and skeletal muscle to assess the stability and predictability of skeletal muscle concentrations as compared with femoral concentrations. Analysis showed skeletal muscle was a sensitive matrix for the detection of morphine; however, there is significant disparity between the skeletal muscle and blood concentrations with a lack of predictability. The authors conclude that thigh skeletal muscle may be used for qualitative identification of morphine; however, interpretation of quantitative results should not be made as there does not seem to be a clear correlation between femoral blood and skeletal muscle concentrations for morphine.
From the Bexar County Medical Examiner's Office, San Antonio, TX.
Veronica M
VM
Hargrove
D Kimberley
DK
Molina
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D053593:Forensic Toxicology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009020:Morphine / Q000032:analysis*; D018482:Muscle, Skeletal / Q000737:chemistry*; D009294:Narcotics / Q000032:analysis*; D012044:Regression Analysis
D009294:Narcotics; D009020:Morphine