Ethylglucuronide et éthylsulfate, marqueurs biologiques de la consommation d'alcool

Ethanol is the most frequently psychoactive substance used in France, leading to major public health pro-blems. Alcohol intake detection might be important in a variety of clinical and forensic settings. Interestin-gly, ethylglucuronide (EtG) and ethylsulfate (EtS) are potentially direct markers of alcohol consumption, being detected in various biological samples such as blood, urine or hair. Moreover, since their detection timeframe corresponds to few hours until several days, these two biomarkers can prove ethanol intake even after the complete elimination of alcohol from the body. We describe herein the metabolic pathway of ethanol leading to EtG and EtS production, the currently used methods for their determination, the precautions in data interpretation and clinical applications of the measurement of these two biomarkers of alcohol misuse.