Browse the latest forensic toxicology articles or search the collection.
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What Does CBD and Antibiotic Synergy Mean in a Lab Test?
A laboratory study used growth and time-kill assays to test CBD with polymyxin B against resistant bacteria.
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What an Adverse Event Report Can Establish About CBD
An analysis of European safety reports illustrates how to distinguish a suspected reaction from an estimate of risk.
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Why Storage History Matters When Retesting Cannabis Evidence
A one-year study tracked how cannabinoids and terpenoids changed in stored flowers and extracts.
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Could Stored Cannabis Test Differently Months Later? A One-Year Experiment
Milay and colleagues tracked cannabinoid and terpenoid profiles for a year in whole and ground cannabis flower and in extracts stored in the dark. The work illustrates why a product’s condition when tested can differ from its condition when collected. What changed in the experiment Among the tested temperatures, 25 °C produced the largest changes…
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Who Should Know About an Alcohol Ankle Monitor Before Surgery?
A published case report described a patient whose alcohol ankle monitor was noticed in the operating room after intubation for elective robotic surgery. The authors reported a gap in documentation and handoff between the preoperative and operating-room teams. The procedure went ahead after the team reassessed its plan, and the report described no ankle injury.…
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In a 418-Death Overdose Series, Which Records Actually Had Toxicology Results?
A retrospective review by Eigner and colleagues identified 418 overdose deaths in Allen County, Indiana, from 2008 through 2015. The authors drew on death certificates, coroner records and available toxicology reports. They reported that opioids were the most frequently identified drug class, followed by benzodiazepines. The denominator changes with the question Toxicology reports were available…
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How Researchers Built a Matrix-Matched Blank for Cannabinoid Testing
A calibration sample should behave enough like the unknown sample for the comparison to make sense. That can be difficult in hemp testing because the plant material already contains the target compounds. Mastellone and colleagues addressed the problem while developing an ultrasound-assisted cannabinoid extraction using eutectic solvents. How they made the comparison The authors exhaustively…
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How to Evaluate Possible Opioid Withdrawal After ICU Weaning
A prospective study at two trauma ICUs assessed withdrawal after opioid weaning in 54 mechanically ventilated adults. Eligible patients had received regular intravenous opioids for more than 72 hours. Clinicians evaluated symptoms using DSM-5 criteria around weaning episodes. What the cohort showed The researchers identified opioid-associated withdrawal in 16.7% of the selected cohort, with a…
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What to Request When Reviewing a SCRAM Alcohol Alert
Start with the full set of time-stamped readings, the event report and the rule used to classify the event. These records let you trace how the reviewer moved from individual measurements to the reported conclusion.
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The Oral-Fluid Stability Samples Combined Several Collection Times
Each stability pool combined specimens collected before and at several times after smoking. The experiment tested that mixture’s storage behavior, not the stability of every separate collection time. Pools remained participant-specific The investigators created one pool for each of fifteen participants from portions collected at −1.5, 1.5, 3.5, 5, 8, 10, 12 and 14 hours…
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Low Sweat-Patch Extraction Recovery Did Not Mean the Reported THC Was Equally Low
The method reported patch recovery of 44–46%, while blind quality-control patches were quantified acceptably. Physical extraction recovery and final concentration accuracy were different performance measurements. The paper reported both outputs For the oral-dosing workflow, recovery from patches was 44–46%, with a quantification limit of 0.4 ng THC per patch. Separately, blind low-, medium- and high-level…
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The Two Sweat Laboratories Added the Internal Standard at Different Stages
The two analytical workflows introduced deuterated THC at different preparation stages. An internal standard added to an extract cannot directly track everything that happened before that addition. The method difference was explicit For the oral-dosing group, the deuterated internal standard was added directly to the patch before extraction. In the other laboratory’s procedure, it was…
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Some Daily Sweat Patches Were Not Tested After a Negative Weekly Patch
The researchers analyzed all weekly patches but did not test every daily patch when its corresponding weekly patch was negative. The daily results should not be described as an exhaustive independently measured daily series. The testing rule followed collection In the oral-THC arm, daily and weekly patches were collected during washout, dosing and follow-up. The…
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The CBD Sleep Volunteers Had Very Limited Cannabis Histories
The sleep study excluded nicotine use and enrolled volunteers with no recent cannabis exposure and very limited lifetime marijuana use. Its findings are not direct evidence about nightly CBD use in frequent cannabis consumers. The exposure history was restrictive Participants were nonsmokers, had taken no medications for at least three months and reported no marijuana…
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Food, Caffeine and Prior Sleep Were Controlled Before the CBD Sleep Sessions
The sleep trial’s null findings followed a controlled pre-session routine. Food timing, caffeine and alcohol restrictions, and prior-night sleep requirements were part of the experimental conditions. The preparation was specified Participants were instructed to avoid alcohol and caffeine for at least twenty-four hours before visits. Those reporting fewer than six hours of sleep the preceding…
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The CBD Sleep Study Matched Participants When Assigning Treatment Sequence
The sleep experiment used matching when allocating CBD-first and placebo-first sequences. Matching supported baseline comparability but did not make the two sessions interchangeable or prove that all order effects were absent. How sequence allocation worked Eligible volunteers were matched on sex, age and education. The treatment sequence for one member of a pair was chosen…
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The CBD Expectancy Stressor Combined Cold-Water Pain With Mental Arithmetic
The expectancy experiment used a stress procedure with physical and psychological components. Its results cannot be described simply as a test of CBD expectations during public speaking or ordinary daily worry. The laboratory challenge was specific The Maastricht Acute Stress Test combined hand immersion in 2°C water with mental arithmetic under negative feedback and videotaping.…
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CBD Belief Ratings Were Single-Item Measures, Not Anxiety Diagnoses
The study measured prior CBD beliefs using three researcher-compiled questions. These ratings described expectations about CBD and should not be presented as diagnoses of anxiety or validated treatment-selection tests. What participants rated Before the experimental sessions, participants rated how strongly they believed CBD improved mood, reduced stress and reduced anxiety. Each statement used a ten-point…
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The CBD Expectancy Trial Selected People With Cannabis Experience but No Cannabis-Oil Experience
Participants needed some lifetime cannabis experience but had to be cannabis-oil naive. That combination was intended to make the labeling manipulation believable and limits generalization to experienced CBD-oil consumers. Selection was part of the experiment The study recruited healthy adults who had used cannabis at least once, reported use no more than twice weekly in…
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Cannabinoid Assay Precision Was Tested at Defined Concentrations
The postmortem assay’s precision experiments used specified fortified concentrations. Their coefficients of variation were analytical performance measurements, not a complete uncertainty estimate for every case interpretation. What the validation tested The authors assessed replicate analyses at 0.1, 0.5 and 1 microgram per milliliter, reporting within-day and between-day coefficients of variation and relative mean errors. They…