Journal of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Analysis
On-site screening and GC–MS analysis of cocaine and heroin metabolites in body-packers urine
Introduction
Body-packers or “mules” are people who ingest packets filled with illicit drugs (typically cocaine or heroin) in the attempt to pass undetected through airport customs. From the first report of 1973 about an individual who swallowed a condom filled with hashish in Toronto [1], the smuggling of illicit drugs either swallowed or inserted into the rectum and/or vagina is becoming increasingly common [2], [3]. The detection of this practice is of major importance, not only in the apprehension and prosecution of these smugglers, but also eventual severe health consequences [4]. The “body-packer syndrome” can show the features of acute drug intoxication, intestinal occlusion and delirium leading in some cases to sudden death [5], [6], [7].
Suspicious circumstances (e.g. travel route, person's behaviour, refusal of meals during flight, signs of intoxication, information by foreign or local police) can induce customs agents to stop suspected “body-packers” at airport after disembarking. The diagnosis of body packing can be started based on physical examination (e.g. abdominal and rectal examinations), but subsequent abdomen radiography is necessary to confirm internal concealment of drugs and induce packets passing after a purge [2], [4]. Nonetheless, some types of packaging may not be always visible on abdominal radiographs [8]. Moreover, to avoid detection pregnant women are used as body-packers, since exploration by X-rays is prohibited in these individuals, unless strong evidences of smuggling are available [9].
Detection of illicit drugs in urine from body-packers by immunological screening method, confirmed by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS), has been sparsely reported during the nineties and the application of on-site rapid screening methods was essentially lacking. Contradictory results led some authors to conclude for beneficial role of urinalysis and some others for its limited outcome [10], [11], [12].
We aimed to assess the reliability of an on-site immunochromatographic test for screening the presence of cocaine and heroin metabolites in urine from suspected body-packers, confirming the obtained results by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry and X-ray examination.
Section snippets
Chemicals and materials
Cozart® rapid urine multi-panel test was gently donated by Cozart Italia (Pomezia, Roma, Italy).
Cocaine-HCl, benzoylecgonine tetrahydrate (BZE), morphine-HCl, nalorphine-HCl, used as internal standard, I.S., were purchased from Salars (Como, Italy). N,O-Bis(trimethylsilyl) trifluoroacetamide (BSTFA) with 1% trimethylchlorosilane (TMCS) was obtained from Sigma–Aldrich (Milano, Italy). Bond Elut Certify solid-phase extraction (SPE) columns were from Varian (Palo Alto, CA, USA). Ultrapure water
Results and discussion
Of the 64 analyzed urine samples, on-site screening gave 29 positive results (26 for cocaine, 2 for cocaine and heroin and 1 for heroin) and 35 negative results (Table 1).
Of the 29 positive screening results, all confirmed by GC–MS for the presence of cocaine and/or heroin metabolites, 24 were from body-packers as demonstrated by X-ray examination (Table 1). Specifically, abdominal radiographs disclosed 19 cases of body packing by ingestion, 1 by ingestion and rectal insertion, 1 only by rectal
Conclusion
Detection of body packing can be a difficult task because most of the smugglers behave normally, and due to the increasing of sophistication of packaging it is not always possible to disclose internal concealment of drugs by abdominal radiographs.
In this study, we showed that there is a striking relation between the presence of drugs in urine and body packing of cocaine and heroin. The on-site Cozart® rapid urine multi-panel test used to screen the presence of cocaine and heroin metabolites in
Acknowledgments
The authors thank Dr. Federico Ferro From Cozart Italia S.r.l. for providing the on-site drug test for urine screening for cocaine and opiates.
The authors are grateful to the “Comando Gruppo Guardia Di Finanza Di Fiumicino” for their helpful cooperation during all the steps of the present investigation.
References (16)
- et al.
Lancet
(1988) - et al.
Forensic Sci. Int.
(2002) Forensic Sci. Int.
(2004)- et al.
Forensic Sci. Int.
(2005) - et al.
J. Emerg. Nurs.
(2006) - et al.
Ann. Emerg. Med.
(2006) - et al.
J. Pharm. Biomed. Anal.
(2007) - et al.
J. Pharm. Biomed. Anal.
(2006)
Cited by (32)
Ultra-trace SERS detection of cocaine and heroin using bimetallic gold–silver nanostars (BGNS-Ag)
2023, Analytica Chimica ActaClinical features and risk factors associated with prenatal exposure to drugs of abuse
2021, Anales de PediatriaInterest of toxicological data in medical management of intracorporeal drugs carriers: Two case reports
2018, Toxicologie Analytique et CliniqueThe role of alkylsilyl derivatization techniques in the analysis of illicit drugs by gas chromatography
2015, Microchemical JournalCitation Excerpt :However, this so called ‘disadvantage’ is dwarfed in comparison to several advantages associated with the GC analysis of derivatized compounds (increased selectivity, sensitivity and the possible identification and quantification of numerous species on a single column, simultaneously). Comparing the limited selectivity and sensitivity properties in the GC quantification of illicit drugs in their initial forms [13–32] with the variously derivatized species [33–80], manifesting considerable bettered analytical performance characteristics, the need of derivatization proved to be evident and advantageous. The list of species reviewed in this paper, along with their abbreviations, is shown in Table 1.
Molecularly imprinted polymer for the selective extraction of cocaine and its metabolites, benzoylecgonine and ecgonine methyl ester, from biological fluids before LC-MS analysis
2014, Journal of Chromatography B: Analytical Technologies in the Biomedical and Life SciencesCitation Excerpt :The sample preparation depends mainly on the nature of the biological sample. For example, for plasma samples, the treatments mainly consists on protein precipitation [5], liquid–liquid extraction (LLE) [9–12], or solid phase extraction (SPE) [13–15]. In the case of urine, SPE is often preferred for sample treatment to filtration [6], dilution [7], or centrifugation [16] because of its versatility.