Quest Diagnostics Launches New 88-Compound Novel Psychoactive Substance Test Panel

These findings align with a recent report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) highlighting the increasing connection between xylazine and opioid overdose deaths while also revealing growing misuse of other NPS.

Additional key findings include:

• Xylazine positivity among fentanyl-positive specimens was most prevalent in the Southeast (~90%), Northeast (~80%) and Eastern (~60%) U.S. regions. Results in the Southwest (<30%) and on the West Coast (<20%) suggest xylazine has yet to fully penetrate these U.S. regions.
• One third (32.7%) of fentanyl positive specimens were also positive for xylazine and nearly all (97.7%) specimens positive for xylazine were also positive for fentanyl.
• Nearly 1 in 5 (19%) amphetamines-positive specimens showed fentanyl combining.
• Heroin use rapidly declined, as positivity overall fell from 1.1% in 2021 to 0.4% in 2022.

The Health Trends analysis also found that specimens in areas with demographics linked to low income levels were nearly 7 times more likely to test positive for nonprescribed fentanyl than those linked to high-income communities. The researchers theorize that these differences are due to comparatively higher quality of care and generally greater access to resources in high-income communities. 

To access the full Health Trends report, click here.

"Our Health Trends data demonstrates the importance of considering all possible NPS, not just xylazine, in clinical drug testing," said Harvey W. Kaufman, M.D., medical director and head of the Health Trends research program. "The faster public health and policy makers catch up with the growing problem of synthetic drugs, the greater the likelihood of curbing a dangerous and evolving drug epidemic before more lives are lost and more families and communities suffer irreversible harm."

For more information, please visit www.QuestDrugMonitoring.com.

Quest Diagnostics Health Trends studies are performed on aggregate deidentified laboratory data in compliance with applicable privacy regulations and the company's strict privacy policies, and follow procedures approved by the WCG Institutional Review Board. The present study's strengths include its large data set, geographic scope, and validated testing by the highly reliable mass spectrometry method. Its limitations include geographic disparities and inability to validate or contextualize test results with medical records. The terms high- and low-income communities refer to certain geographies that have median income levels that fall in the highest and lowest quintile as determined by the U.S. Census Bureau. For the full study methodology, including strengths and weaknesses, please refer to the full report.

About Quest Diagnostics Health Trends®
Quest Diagnostics Health Trends® is a series of scientific reports that provide insights into health issues, based on patient laboratory data, to empower better patient care, population health management and public health policy. The reports are based on the HIPAA-compliant Quest Diagnostics database of more than 60 billion deidentified laboratory test datapoints. The Quest database is believed to be the largest of its kind in healthcare. Health Trends research has yielded novel insights into allergies and asthma, cancer, COVID-19, diabetes, heart disease, hepatitis, influenza, Lyme disease, prescription drug misuse and workplace wellness. Quest Diagnostics also produces the Drug Testing Index (DTI)™, a series of reports on national workplace drug positivity trends based on the company's employer workplace drug testing data.

About Quest Diagnostics
Quest Diagnostics empowers people to take action to improve health outcomes. Derived from the world's largest database of clinical lab results, our diagnostic insights reveal new avenues to identify and treat disease, inspire healthy behaviors and improve health care management. Quest annually serves one in three adult Americans and half the physicians and hospitals in the United States, and our nearly 50,000 employees understand that, in the right hands and with the right context, our diagnostic insights can inspire actions that transform lives. www.QuestDiagnostics.com.

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SOURCE Quest Diagnostics