Methanol as an Alcohol Abuse Marker in Forensic Samples

In this study, methanol in post-mortem alcoholic samples with and without ethanol present at the time of death, from social drinkers and teetotallers, was determined with gas chromatography with headspace injection to study the possibility of using methanol as an alcoholism marker in post-mortem samples. Although, a higher methanol concentration was found both in samples from alcoholics and social drinkers than in the teetotallers group, the specificity of methanol as a marker for alcoholism is low, because the difference in the consumption of ethanol between heavy and social drinking cannot be established, consequently it can only be used as a valid alcoholism marker when ethanol is not present. A multiple regression analysis revealed that the factors which impact the methanol concentration the most are a fatty liver and the consumption of ethanol amongst alcoholics, while factors traditionally linked to alcoholism such as cirrhosis do not have an impact on the methanol concentration found.