4 ms·
"toxicology results would be done in two or three months" This seems like a long time, is it normal?
by djfm 11y ago
"toxicology results would be done in two or three months"
This seems like a long time, is it normal?
- jack9 11y agoYes. I had a relative die of morphine OD (needles! were still there next to him). It took months for confirmation from the medical examiner.
- tw04 11y agoNot excessively (it's not excessively long, yes it's normal). Toxicology is usually at least 8 weeks unless we're talking about someone famous enough to have it rushed.
- raverbashing 11y agoReal life is not a CSI episode, also labs have a limited processing ability But maybe tests are done in stages? Like, if nothing obvious shows up on first tests then some other ones are done?
- DanBC 11y agoI don't think anyone is expecting "enhance enhance enhance ah, this person had $SUBSTANCE in their blood", but months does feel a bit long. It'd be interesting to see what the bottlenecks are and how to improve them.
- fnordfnordfnord 11y agoState and local gov't funding level for forensic labs. It costs money to do it correctly, and nobody wants to spend that kind of money, even though we wind up paying more, and imprisoning people wrongly. http://www.texastribune.org/2013/04/05/commission-looks-misconduct-dps-worker/ http://www.texastribune.org/2013/04/05/commission-looks-misc... Harris county, Texas just recently got a new one because of similarly disturbing corruption and incompetence. http://www.harriscountytx.gov/ifs/ http://www.harriscountytx.gov/ifs/
- angersock 11y agoYep. They're currently in the same building as a big medical incucellerbator. The Nabisco building is silly big.
- digler999 11y agoPathetic they can get millions to militarize the police, or a super high tech bomb squad vehicle/robots/xrays to investigate a bunch of abandoned suitcases, but they are suddenly poor when it comes to financing something that could actually save lives. in the case where, say, a serial rapist/killer hasn't been caught, there can be a backlog of untested DNA from other crime scenes that may identify the suspect, but haven't been tested because of the backlog.
- jordigh 11y agoI understand it's mostly volume of requests vs available lab techs.
- yasiel 11y agoI used to work at a drug testing facility. Our typical test urine and saliva took 3 major steps. 1) Negative Screening (6hrs) - Figuring out what compounds show up initially. Special dyes were use to identify potential compounds. Not conclusive but narrows down the next steps 2) Extraction (10 - 18 hrs) - Separate the target compounds from the rest of compounds/proteins in the sample fluid. 3) Postive Certification via GCMS (2hrs - 16hrs) - The extracted compounds were ionized (broken into predictable pieces) then sent through the GCMS to where a signal signature determined. Each step included equipment expensive materials and equipment. The last step is was the most expensive and error prone. The GCMS machines need maintenance and calibration. They cost anywhere from $30,000 to $70,000. Sometimes we lost samples because the machine would lose it's calibration and wouldn't be enough to start another set. We took in samples on a national scale, but I can see how a smaller non-commercial lab accumulate a large backlog. This was like 10 years ago but I don't see the technology changing that much.
- JustSomeNobody 11y agoI wouldn't doubt it. I imagine it's due to a backlog and lack of funding.
- InclinedPlane 11y agoEach test runs quickly, but there is likely a huge backup.
- morganvachon 11y agoIt depends on the lab's backlog. When I worked as an evidence technician, it would sometimes be six months or more between dropping off the samples and getting the results. I had one murder case that took nearly two years to get back, longer than my time in that position.
- cbsmith 11y agoIt's sadly pretty typical.