TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2004//
TI  - Nicotine and cotinine levels in blood and urine from forensic autopsy cases
JO  - Legal medicine (Elsevier)
A1  - Moriya, Fumio
A1  - Hashimoto, Yoshiaki
SP  - 164
EP  - 169
VL  - 6
IS  - 3
N2  - We measured nicotine and cotinine levels in blood and urine from 31 forensic autopsy cases. Initially, we developed a sensitive and reproducible gas chromatographic method with a minimum limit of detection of 2.1 ng/ml for both nicotine and cotinine. Calibration curves for nicotine and cotinine were linear in the ranges of 2.1-1030 ng/ml (r2=0.994-0.999) and 2.1-1380 ng/ml (r2=0.998-0.999) respectively. Our population included 13 smokers and eight of these smokers committed suicide. They showed high levels of nicotine and cotinine at 65.1-205 ng/ml (mean: 115 ng/ml) and 31.3-938 ng/ml (mean: 405 ng/ml) in blood, respectively, and 234-7290 ng/ml (mean: 1940 ng/ml) and 143-4620 ng/ml (mean: 1170 ng/ml) in urine, respectively. None of these individuals consumed nicotine preparations or tobacco leaves. In five smokers who did not commit suicide, nicotine and cotinine levels were 4.4-62.1 ng/ml (mean: 33.2 ng/ml) and 49.9-217 ng/ml (mean: 140 ng/ml) in blood, respectively, and 158-314 ng/ml (mean: 246 ng/ml) and 68.9-300 ng/ml (mean: 179 ng/ml) in urine, respectively. Our results suggest that there may be a marked increase in consumption of cigarettes in smokers with suicidal thoughts.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 1344-6223
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.legalmed.2004.04.005
ID  - ref1
ER  -