Synthetic cathinones, commonly referred to as “bath salts,” are powerful amphetamine-like psychostimulants, and new derivatives are constantly appearing in the illicit market to evade judicial consequences. To keep up with these new stimulant drugs, a low-sample-size liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry method was validated to quantify 30 synthetic cathinones in postmortem blood including N-ethylpentylone and eutylone. Mixed mode cation exchange solid-phase extraction using 0.25 mL postmortem blood was performed followed by detection using a triple quadrupole mass spectrometer operating electrospray ionization in positive mode. The reversed-phase chromatographic separation was achieved in 16 min, resolving all isobaric compounds. The linear range of the calibration curve was 1–500 ng/mL (R 2 > 0.99) for all compounds. Limit of quantification (LOQ) and limit of detection were determined to be at 1 ng/mL. Both imprecision and bias were evaluated and had met all allowed criteria (CV and bias 500 ng/mL. While ethylone and methylone were detected in 2015, cases between 2016 and 2017 were predominantly butylone, dibutylone, pentylone and N-ethylpentylone which had also exhibited a significant increase in 2018. To our knowledge, this method is the most comprehensive methodology for the determination of up-to-date synthetic cathinones currently available in whole blood.
