Question

Describe three different samples that can be used to test for poisons? What are the advantages and disadvantages of these samples

Answer 1

Answer: Three samples that can be used to test for poisons are blood samples, hair samples, and gastric contents samples.

Advantages of hair samples area is that it can indicate past exposure to toxins or poisons and also provide information on how long the exposure has been going on. Poisons can sometimes be detected in hair for long periods of time. The advantages of gastric contents samples area is it shows whether the poison was digested or not. An advantage of blood samples is that it’s the most useful toxicological samples. The disadvantage of hair samples is that the results can be tainted by external sources. The disadvantage of gastric content samples is that it doesn’t always show which toxin was digested. The disadvantage of blood samples is if taken near or from the heart it may have artificially high levels of toxins that wouldn’t reflect the amount distributed throughout the body at the time of death.

Explanation: