BMC Emergency Medicine


Open Access Highly Access Research article

Using molecular similarity to highlight the challenges of routine immunoassay-based drug of abuse/toxicology screening in emergency medicine

Matthew D Krasowski1,2,8*, Anthony F Pizon3, Mohamed G Siam4, Spiros Giannoutsos2, Manisha Iyer1 and Sean Ekins5,6,7

Author Affiliations

1 Department of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

2 Department of Pathology, Division of Clinical Chemistry, Toxicology and Therapeutic Drug Monitoring Laboratory, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Presbyterian/Shadyside, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

3 Department of Emergency Medicine, Division of Medical Toxicology, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

4 Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology, Zagazig University, Zagazig, Egypt

5 Collaborations in Chemistry, Jenkintown, PA, USA

6 Department of Pharmacology, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Piscataway, NJ, USA

7 Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Maryland, Baltimore, MD, USA

8 Department of Pathology (6233 RCP), The University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, 200 Hawkins Drive, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA

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BMC Emergency Medicine 2009, 9:5 doi:10.1186/1471-227X-9-5

Published: 28 April 2009

Additional files

Additional file 1:

Similarity data and tricylic antidepressant/phencyclidine assay data. Spreadsheet with multiple tables contains data on similarity analyses, marketed assays, most prescribed medications, and cross-reactivity studies for phencyclidine and tricyclic antidepressant assays.

Format: XLS Size: 454KB Download file

This file can be viewed with: Microsoft Excel Viewer

Open Data

Additional file 2:

Historical trends in prescription drug usage in the United States that can impact drug of abuse testing. Data on trends in prescription drugs usage is presented by classes of drugs.

Format: PDF Size: 758KB Download file

This file can be viewed with: Adobe Acrobat Reader

Open Data