Abstract
Although there are not enough researches in our country about drug abuse depending upon toxicological analysis, there is an impression that cocaine abuse is becoming widespread from current data. As a result, appropriate analytical toxicological method should be established in order to determine the drug abuse. Cocaine is a natural alkoloid that is toxic to central nervous system, heart, liver, neuromuscular system and kidneys. Widespread abuse of cocaine is an important health problem in society. Cocaine is usually misused with ethanol, opioids, marihuana and sedative hypnotics. In our study, qualitative and quantitative methods are established to determine cocaine levels from urine by GC/MS (gas chromatography mass spectrometry). Precision, accuracy, specificity of the established method is evaluated. In order to isolate cocaine from urine, liquid-liquid and solid phase extraction methods are applied and compared. Recovery rates of 77.6% by liquid-liquid extraction method and 81.2% by SPE method were obtained. In one of the suspicious urine samples, morphine is determined besides methylecgonine and benzoylecgonine