Forensic pharmacokinetics: A new dimension for drug related medico-legal cases

Abstract

The incidence of drug related medico legal cases are increasing day by day, leading to frequent requirement of estimation of dose size administered or ingested by deceased, based on either postmortem blood level or concentration of drug in urine. Postmortem changes begin at cellular level with the onset of ischemia, and depending on its duration, structure and function of various organs and tissue gradually deteriorate which influence the distribution of drugs in the body fluids and tissues. So, to estimate drug concentration of deceased, postmortem redistribution phenomenon has to be considered. Deceased drug concentration may not reflect the actual concentration at the time of death, and estimating antemortem drug concentration from deceased blood level may be misleading if it is not judiciously used to simulate the dose versus toxicity relationship. In this article authors have emphasis on various aspect of co-relation of drugs level following death and different factors that influence while predicting actual drug concentration for medico legal drugs related cases.