Ambient particulate matter is a ubiquitous air pollutant, which can have detrimental effects on human health. Trace metals might induce part of these adverse health effects, therefore trace species concentrations are often determined in air pollution studies. Most studies rely on X-Ray spectroscopy for multi-element determination in particles collected on very specific filter substrates. We developed a more versatile approach in order to use a variety of filter and substrate materials commonly used for organic pollutant monitoring, including polyurethane foam (PUF), polypropylene mesh (PP), and quartz fiber filters. Our approach consists of completely dissolving the substrates and collected particles by microwave assisted digestion prior to analysis by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP/MS). We aimed at quantifying a series of 30 elements (Li, Rb, Y, Mo, Ag, Cd, Sb, Cs, Ba, W, Pb, U, Na, Mg, Al, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Ga, Sr, K, Ca, As, and Se). We will discuss the optimization of the digestion parameters for the complete digestion of the different substrate materials as well as for minimal contamination and loss of the analytes. While quartz fiber filters could be completely digested with HNO3-HF, a mixture of HNO3-H2O2-HCl-HF was most efficient for the PUF and PP substrates. The optimized procedures were evaluated against samples spiked with NIST standard reference materials and showed good agreement with the certified values. Finally, the method was applied to samples collected locally in Arizona and preliminary results will be presented.