‘You mean you're not doing it already?’ A national sentinel toxico‐surveillance system for detecting illicit, emerging and novel psychoactive drugs in presentations to emergency departments

Abstract

AbstractPatients presenting to the ED after using illicit drugs, including novel psychoactive substances, are a unique source of information on substances that are directly causing acute harm in the community. Conventionally, illicit drug intoxications are assessed and managed in EDs based on self‐report and presenting symptoms, with no objective data on the causative agent. The Emerging Drugs Network of Australia (EDNA) is a national toxico‐surveillance system that provides analytic data on these drugs, from sentinel Emergency Departments. It is a collaborative national network of emergency physicians, toxicologists, forensic laboratories and public health authorities. The key benefit of EDNA is the capacity to provide timely laboratory‐confirmed toxicology data on emerging drug‐related threats in the community. This leads to improvements in clinical, forensic laboratory and public health harm reduction responses, reflecting rapid translation of the research.