Evaluation of the IDS One-Steptrade mark ELISA kits
for the detection of illicit drugs in hair
by
Pujol ML, Cirimele V, Tritsch PJ, Villain M, Kintz P.
Laboratoire ChemTox, 3 rue Grüninger,
67400 Illkirch, France.
Forensic Sci Int. 2007 Jul 10;

ABSTRACT

This work presents the validation of a new immunological assay, the One-Steptrade mark enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) tests from International Diagnostic Systems Corp. for the screening of drugs of abuse (cannabis, amphetamines, opiates, and cocaine) in human hair, with subsequent GC-MS confirmation. After decontamination and segmentation into small pieces, 50mg of hair sample were incubated in 1ml of methanol during 16h at 40 degrees C. A 100muL aliquot was collected and evaporated to dryness in presence of 100muL of methanol/hydrochloric acid (99:1, v/v) to avoid amphetamines loss. The dried extract was dissolved in 100muL of the "sample and standard diluent" solution included in the kit. This solution was submitted to analysis according to the recommended instructions of the manufacturer. During the validation phase, GC-MS confirmations were conducted according to our fully validated and published methods for opiates, cocaine, cannabis, and amphetamines determinations in hair. In a last development step, these procedures were slightly modified to directly confirm ELISA results by GC-MS using the methanolic extract. Ninety-three specimens were simultaneously screened by the ELISA tests (103 for tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)) and confirmed by GC-MS. Twenty were found positive for cannabis (THC: 0.10-6.50ng/mg), 21 for cocaine (0.50-55.20ng/mg), 24 for opiates (6-acetylmorphine (6-AM): 0.20-11.60ng/mg, MOR: 0.20-8.90ng/mg, codeine (COD): 0.20-5.90ng/mg), and 13 for amphetamines (AP: 0.20 and 0.27ng/mg, methamphetamine (MAP): 0.30 and 1.10ng/mg, methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA): 0.22-17.80ng/mg). No false negative results were observed according to the Society of Hair Testing's (SoHT) cutoffs (0.5ng/mg for cocaine, 0.2ng/mg for opiates and amphetamines, and 0.1ng/mg for THC). The One-Steptrade mark ELISA kits appear suitable due to their sensitivity and specificity for drug of abuse screening in hair. This technology should find interest in workplace drug testing or driving license regranting, especially when many samples have to be tested with a high rate of negative samples, as ELISA is an easy and high-throughput method.

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