Public Health
Drug Checking
by Mail
We are a public service of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
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When people know what substances are in drugs, they can make informed decisions to reduce overdose risk and prevent other harms. At our state-of-the-art chemistry lab on the UNC campus, we use GCMS to test street drug samples sent by 140+ programs in 35+ states. All results are completely anonymous.
Search our database of 9,000+ samples by entering Sample ID, location, or drug. Or click the button to browse most recent.
Try: Greensboro or Texas or xylazine
Because life is precious
Street drugs in America right now are super variable and treacherous. Drug checking helps individuals make better decisions about their health. Knowing what’s in street drugs can help outbreak investigations and timely alerts. We also help doctors treat patients better and quicker by clueing them in to what might be causing physical harms.
Working with community
Let’s be clear: The best drug checking happens at point of care in harm reduction programs. We are proud to support with a low cost “confirmatory” lab testing. (Although we believe FTIR and GCMS are equal and tell us different things.)
If you’re interested in drug checking generally, check out the Drug Checkers Guild drop-in hours at Remedy Alliance For The People. They meet second and fourth Wednesdays 4pm EST/3pm CST/1pm PST (link to zoom).
Our mail-based paradigm also meets the needs of groups without access to drug checking equipment, and those living under antiquated laws preventing drug checking. User unions can use drug checking to answer their own questions to protect their communities. For health departments, we can turn samples around quicker than crime/tox labs during an overdose outbreak. Our model can also help universities with underutilized lab equipment get involved in harm reduction services. This video shows how it all comes together in North Carolina.
Our Lab
A Thermo Exactive gas chromatography-mass spectrometer (GC-MS) is used for analysis, housed in the Department of Chemistry at UNC. The instrument is unique in that it provides both gas chromatography separations, as well as high resolution/accurate mass measurements. This allows chemical formula confirmation of opioids, byproducts, and fillers in the samples. This platform allows for a more sensitive analysis with substance identification that is definitive. We are a full service chemistry lab with DEA authorization to handle Schedule 1-V controlled substances. However, we do not work with law enforcement.
Our lab meets all laboratory-standard certifications and is subject to mandatory inspections from regulatory agencies: DEA, NC DHHS, etc. Our chemists are required to maintain GLP training and certification.
Better Design for Drug Alerts
We don’t stop at chemistry. We conduct detailed statistical analyses to identify emerging and deadly substances in the drug supply. We also design more effective health communications. We are building an open source library of hand-drawn illustrations for drug alerts. Working with team members in advertising, we are also conducting randomized message trials to figure out how maximize understanding, and minimize unintended consequences in alerts from drug checking.
Check out our Harm Reduction Chemical Dictionary to help make sense of molecule names.
In the News
Chapel Hill
Office: Injury Prevention Research Center @ 725 MLK Jr. Blvd., CB 7505, Chapel Hill, NC 27599 USA
Laboratory: Caudill Labs @ 131 South Road on the UNC Campus
Phone
(919) 966-5725
Our Team
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Dr. Nabarun Dasgupta
Pharmaco-epidemiologist
@nabarund -
Erin Tracy
Chemist
@LunaJBear -
Colin Miller
Community Liaison
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Maryalice Nocera
Logistics
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Dr. Brandie Ehrmann
Chemistry Lab Director
@BrandieEhrmann -
Dr. Allison Lazard
Health Communications
@AllisonLazard -
Marlyn Pulido
Drug Alert Communications
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Brittain Peck
Illustrator
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LaMonda Sykes
Finance
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Illyana Massey
Community Liaison
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Drew Hackelman
Software Developer
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Zoë Martin del Campo
Intern
Data Privacy
All of our data are anonymously collected and publicly available. We have no knowledge about individual people who submitted samples. No names, nothing. We use information about the samples and the card for data analysis. If you are interested in using these data for research or scientific purposes, contact us. We do not provide data to law enforcement.
Partners & Funders
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Key partners for this effort include the North Carolina Survivors Union, Brandeis University and the University of North Carolina Injury Prevention Research Center.
We are grateful to the Alliance for Collaborative Drug Checking (ACDC) for being such an amazing community of practice we can turn to for support.
The NC Survivors Union is a totally awesome self-support group of people with lived experience of drug use, operating within a drop-in center and harm reduction program in Greensboro, North Carolina.
We also thank North Carolina State University for providing us access to their GCMS instrument as backup.
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US Food and Drug Administration (2023-2025), single study on overdose and naloxone utilization.
Vital Strategies, operations and outreach (2023-25)
Injury and Violence Prevention Branch of the NC Department of Health and Human Services, via funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2023, data visualizations)
North Carolina General Assembly via the NC Collaboratory, using Opioid Settlement Funds (2023-24, operations)
Foundation for Opioid Response Efforts (2022-23, startup)
Studies at the Opioid Data Lab are conducted by independent researchers and do not necessarily represent the views of funders or partners.
The GCMS instrument was funded through a NIH grant to the Department of Chemistry.
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This project has been reviewed by the University of North Carolina Office of Research Ethics and deemed to be not to be human subjects research.