Non-invasive Testing for Drugs in Fingerprints to Address an Unmet Need of Coroners

每年有超过12万具尸体未经毒理学检查就被英国验尸官释放。这是由于无法在不进行昂贵的尸检的情况下采集所需的侵入性体液/组织样本。然而，这意味着许多可能因故意或意外滥用药物（如阿片类药物）而造成的死亡没有得到报告。申请人采用了东安格利亚大学的研究成果，开发了一种独特的技术，可以通过非侵入性指纹样本识别最近的药物使用历史，使用手持设备只需10分钟即可完成。本项目建议采用这项技术，为验尸官提供一种具有成本效益的药物滥用筛查工具。这项技术在急救医学、罪犯管理和戒毒治疗方面也有很大的潜力。

Each year over 120,000 bodies are released by UK Coroners without toxicology screening. This is due to the inability to take the invasive body fluid/tissue samples required without calling for a costly post-mortem. However, this means that many deaths that may have been caused by intentional or accidental misuse of drugs (such as opiates) go unreported. The applicants, employing technology created from research at the University of East Anglia, has developed a unique technology that allows identification of the recent drug use history from non-invasive fingerprint samples that can be carried out in as little as 10 minutes using a hand-held device. This project proposes to employ this technology to provide Coroners with a cost-effective screening tool for drugs of abuse . The technology also has significant potential for use in emergency medicine, offender management and drug rehabilitation treatment.