The Kentucky Injury Prevention and Research Center, as a bona fide agent for the Kentucky Department for Public Health, collaborates with state, university, and community partners to implement the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Overdose Data to Action (OD2A) surveillance strategies, which includes timely analysis of drug overdose emergency department encounters, fatal drug overdoses using multiple data sources, and an innovative public health surveillance strategy using remnant serum and/or urine samples from patients treated at the University of Kentucky Medical Center Emergency Department for suspected drug overdoses. KyOD2A is a five-year grant that began implementation in September 2023.
As part of the surveillance aspect of the KyOD2A grant, KIPRC will
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Create statewide, regional, and county-level drug overdose dashboards using multiple data sets to allow targeting of prevention efforts to disproportionately affected/underserved people;
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Expand the Kentucky Drug Overdose Alert System using emergency medical services data;
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Monitor fatal and nonfatal drug overdose data sets using multiple data sets, including discharge/billing, EMS, and syndromic data; medical examiner/coroner and forensic toxicology testing data; and biowaste samples from emergency department drug overdose encounters;
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Link EMS data to death certificate data incorporated into the State Unintentional Drug Overdose Reporting System (SUDORS) for deaths;
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Link criminal justice records to overdose decedents; and
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Disseminate findings to KyOD2A and state prevention partners, local harm reduction programs, overdose response teams, and law enforcement partners.
