Determination of anabolic steroids in dried blood using microsampling and gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry: Application to a testosterone gel administration study
Chang et al.
The finding, in our words
A GC-MS/MS method for anabolic steroids in VAMS dried blood from finger pricking demonstrated good precision, accuracy and stability, with results agreeing with serum specimens. In a testosterone gel administration trial, dried blood total testosterone identified transdermal micro-dosing, with concentrations rising up to ten times baseline at nine hours post-application, supporting decentralised doping screening.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
The analysis indicates that dried blood spots and volumetric absorptive microsampling enable minimally invasive monitoring of prohibited substances, with volumetric absorptive microsampling offering improved quantitative reliability over traditional dried spots.
This study compared four dried blood spot devices for glucocorticoid detection, finding that the Mitra VAMS device offered the best combination of analytical recovery and user usability, whilst the HemaXis DB10 showed the least bias compared to whole blood.
The study compared five microsampling devices, including Mitra tips and Tasso-M20, for detecting 27 steroid esters in dried blood by LC-MS/MS, and found that methanol extraction with Girard's reagent P or T provided the best screening sensitivity with detection limits of 0.05 to 1.0 ng/mL, while methoxyamine derivatization was recommended for confirming boldenone and certain testosterone esters. The Tasso-M20 device produced chromatographic interference with methanol extraction that was only partially resolved by using mixed solvents, at the cost of lower recoveries.
The authors validated an LC-MS/MS method for quantifying 18 endogenous steroids and metabolites in 30 μL dried blood VAMS samples from 20 healthy volunteers. Steroids remained stable for up to 100 days across storage temperatures from room temperature to -80 °C and through three freeze-thaw cycles, suggesting VAMS is reliable for doping control and clinical hormone monitoring outside traditional settings.
The study developed and validated a LC-HRMS method for intact IGF-I from VAMS dried blood according to World Anti-Doping Agency requirements and showed agreement with serum measurements, supporting decentralised sampling for antidoping testing.