The environmental impact produced by the presence of drugs of abuse in sediments has been scarcely studied to date, even though many of them may adsorb onto particulate matter due to their physical-chemical properties. This study presents an analytical method for the determination of 20 drugs of abuse and metabolites in sediments. The validated method was satisfactory in terms of linearity (r² >0.99), recovery (90–135 %), repeatability (relative standard deviations <15 %), sensitivity (limits of quantification <2.1 ng/g d.w, except for cannabinoids), and matrix effects (ionization suppression <40 %). The method was applied to the analysis of 144 sediments collected in four Spanish river basins. Cocaine, methadone, and its metabolite 2-ethylidene-1,5-dimethyl-3,3-diphenylpyrrolidine (EDDP) were the most ubiquitous compounds (detection frequencies>36 %), whereas cannabinol, Δ⁹-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), and methadone were the most abundant compounds (up to 44, 37, and 33 ng/g d.w, respectively). The presence of EDDP, THC, and methadone in the sediments of 28 locations may pose a risk to sediment-dwelling organisms. To the author`s knowledge, this is the most extensive study conducted so far on the occurrence of drugs of abuse in sediments, and the first time that sediment-water distribution coefficients for EDDP, methadone, MDMA, and diazepam are reported from field observations.

迄今为止，几乎没有研究过由于沉积物中存在滥用药物而产生的环境影响，尽管其中许多药物由于其物理化学性质可能会吸附到颗粒物上。这项研究提出了一种分析方法，用于测定沉积物中的20种滥用药物和代谢物。经验证的方法在线性方面令人满意（r ²> 0.99），回收率（90–135％），可重复性（相对标准偏差<15％），灵敏度（定量限度<2.1 ng / g dw，大麻素除外）和基质效应（电离抑制率<40％）。该方法用于分析西班牙四个流域收集的144种沉积物。可卡因，美沙酮，和它的代谢产物2-亚乙基-1,5-二甲基-3,3- diphenylpyrrolidine（EDDP）是最普遍的化合物（检测频率> 36％），而大麻酚，Δ ⁹-四氢大麻酚（THC）和美沙酮是最丰富的化合物（分别高达44 ng / g dw和33 ng / g dw）。EDDP，THC和美沙酮存在于28个地点的沉积物中，可能会对居住在沉积物中的生物造成危险。据作者所知，这是迄今为止对沉积物中滥用药物的发生进行的最广泛的研究，也是首次通过实地观察报道EDDP，美沙酮，MDMA和地西epa的沉积水分配系数。