Clinical Toxicology

In 2021 there were more than 106,000 drug overdose deaths in the United States alone (Spencer et al., Drug overdose deaths in the United States, 2001–2021. NCHS Data Brief, No. 457. National Center for Health Statistics, Atlanta). Indeed, substance abuse disorder has reached an all-time high in this country. Furthermore, there is increasing incidence of abuse of drugs manufactured in illicit laboratories, many, if not most, of which are not detectable in conventional drug screening. Thus, an understanding of laboratory testing in clinical toxicology is critically important.