Analytical Toxicology

Drugs and other foreign substances (xenobiotics) and their metabolites, as well as endogenous molecules in some situations, are detected, identified, and measured in biological and associated specimens by analytical toxicology. The use of analytic chemistry tools to the qualitative and/or quantitative estimate of substances that may have harmful effects on living beings is known as analytic toxicology. Analytical toxicology refers to the application of a wide range of qualitative and quantitative chemical, immunochemical, and physical techniques to sample preparation, separation, assay calibration, detection and identification, and quantification in toxicological study and testing. Analytical toxicology is used in the diagnosis and treatment of health problems caused by chemical compounds, as well as the closely related discipline of therapeutic drug monitoring. With gains in sensitivity and specificity, advances in analytical toxicology have introduced both power and challenges to toxicology.