Determination of morphine and 6-monoacetylmorphine in putrefied blood using ultra performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry

This study was performed to develop an ultra-performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method to detect and quantify morphine and 6-monoacetylmorphine in putrefied blood for forensic toxicological purposes. A modified QuEChERS method was implemented as follows:extraction of morphine and 6-monoacetylmorphine from putrefied blood was performed with an acetonitrile-water (4:1, v/v) mixture, and 30 mg NaCl and 60 mg anhydrous MgSO4 were subsequently added as salting out agents to induce phase separation. The supernatant was cleaned by adding 25 mg primary secondary amine sorbent (PSA) and 25 mg anhydrous MgSO4. Separation of the target compounds was performed using a ZORBAX Eclipse Plus C18 column by UPLC over a 4 min gradient elution where 0.01% (v/v) ammonium hydroxide buffer (A) and acetonitrile (B) were used as the mobile phase. MS/MS was used in positive electrospray ionization (ESI+) mode and multiple-reaction monitoring (MRM) was performed to detect the target drugs. This method achieved satisfactory recoveries (R) for morphine and 6-monoacetylmorphine with mean recovery values ranging from 81.84% to 103.44% and 81.03% to 104.46% respectively. The developed method also provided efficient purification of the sample from endogenous interferences with matrix effect (ME) ranging from 83.04% to 107.61%. The method was validated and the limit of detection (LOD) and limit of quantification (LOQ) were 1 and 5 μg/L, respectively, for both compounds and the precision with RSD ranged from 1% to 12%. This method proved to be quick, sensitive, rugged, and suitable for the analysis of illegal drugs in putrefied whole blood.