High-performance thin-layer chromatographic determination of N-ethyl-3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine and its major metabolites in urine and comparison with high-performance liquid chromatography.

The consumption of N-ethyl-3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDE, 1), an analogue of ecstasy, can be detected by direct in situ HPTLC-FTIR measurement of the main metabolite N-ethyl-4-hydroxy-3-methoxyamphetamine (HME, 2). HME (2) can, like the other important metabolite 3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDA, 3) and unchanged MDE (1), be determined quantitatively in urine by HPTLC-UV after two-step automatic development. The results have been compared with those obtained using an HPLC method. The differences were not generally significant. Small deviations were attributable to the different sample preparation methods necessary. The working range for the HPTLC method was between 0.1 and 8.2 micrograms/ml and for the HPLC method between 0.2 and 60.0 micrograms/ml. The method standard deviations were 2.66-4.91% (HPTLC) and 0.48-3.67% (HPLC).