[Suicide with beta-methyldigoxin (author's transl)]

A 50-year-old woman committed suicide by taking an overdose of beta-methyldigoxin. The interval between swallowing the tablets and death was about 60 minutes. Plasma and tissue samples, taken 163 hours after death, were analysed for glycosides by radioimmunoassay. The plasma-glycoside level was 75.1 ng/ml, in the left ventricular myocardium it was 143.2 ng/g wet-weight. and in the right ventricular myocardium 159.7 ng/g wet-weight. The tissue-plasma ratio for the various parts of the heart varied from 0.8 to 2.1. Death occurred in the early distribution stage.