Excellence in Laboratory Practice with the Validation of Opiate Confirmation using Liquid Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry

Introduction/Objective Veterans are more susceptible to opioid addiction as they are more likely to suffer from chronic pain which leads to increased need of confirmed identification of opiates in toxicology laboratories. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) had been a long-accepted method for the quantitative analysis of opiates in urine, but requires tedious, time-consuming, and complex sample preparation steps. On the other hand, liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC/MS) has comparatively simpler sample preparation steps, can handle three times the number of specimens, much faster turnaround times and produces equally valid results. However, the validation experience of this simpler detection method has not been well published, particularly in a Veterans Healthcare Clinical Laboratory setting. Methods/Case Report The quality assurance goal of the validation is to demonstrate that the Agilent 6410 Triple Quadrupole LC/MS (Wilmington DE) is able to identify the same opiate drug analytes performed by the GC-MS. Method to method correlation, within run precision, day to day precision, carryover study, matrix (ion) suppression study, and a limit of detection study were performed as part of this validation. Results (if a Case Study enter NA) For the total of 156 specimens run for the method comparison, there was 94.9% agreement, or 148/156 samples were concordant. The 8 discrepancies had drugs that were present below the cutoff limit of the LC/MS. Within run precision with 20 replicates of negative, positive, and at the cutoff were run with all results as expected. The day to day precision of a positive and negative sample run over 10 days also yielded results as expected. The carryover study demonstrated minimal carryover. The matrix (ion) suppression study showed ion suppression at 16.8%, which is below the amount needed to affect analyte concentrations. The LC/MS was highly sensitive with a limit of detection of >97% at 25 ng/mL. Thus, the result of comparison showed good concordance. Conclusion LC/MS is a simpler, more efficient method of opiate testing that is comparable to GC-MS for the detection of opiate drugs of abuse in urine. This is an example of excellence in laboratory practice by extending the best quality laboratory care with proper validation of instrument methods conducive to laboratory workflow.