title: Driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol in Salzburg and Upper Austria during the years 2003-2007.
abstract: Until 2002 in Austria a blood sample could not be drawn due to regulations stipulated by the Austrian constitution. During the years 2003-2007 alcohol, pharmaceuticals and illicit drugs were analyzed in 1167 blood samples from cases of suspected and drugged drivers. In accordance with the findings of the EU-project Rosita, a wide variety of illicit drugs and medications could be found in blood samples of the drivers where cannabis (50%), opiates (20%), amphetamines (18%), cocaine (15%) and benzodiazepines (20%) were those with the highest prevalence. To enable police and medical officers to identify drivers under the influence of cannabis, a newly developed urinary road-site-test system, Check 24 (Protzek GmbH, Germany), with two different cut-off values for THCCOOH-glucuronide was used. So far, it was not possible to draw any conclusions from a cannabinoid positive urine sample to the actual influence of a driver due to the previous consumption of cannabis. Using this test a better differentiation between recent and temporal earlier consumption was possible. In addition to using the Check 24 system the technology of pupillography (AMTech GmbH, Germany) was applied in cases of drugged driving. For the first time the authors were able to predict the presence of at least one central nervous active substance in the blood of a drugged driver.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Forensic Medicine, University of Salzburg, Ignaz-Harrer-Str. 79, 5020 Salzburg, Austria. thomas.keller@sbg.ac.at
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Keller
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Keller
authors.forename: Edith
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Tutsch-Bauer
authors.forename: Fabio
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Monticelli
mesh_terms: D000428:Alcohol Drinking / Q000453:epidemiology*; D001317:Austria / Q000453:epidemiology; D001334:Automobile Driving / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D001944:Breath Tests; D002492:Central Nervous System Depressants / Q000097:blood; D000431:Ethanol / Q000097:blood; D005554:Forensic Medicine; D020719:Glucuronides / Q000652:urine; D006801:Humans; D007259:Infrared Rays; D009294:Narcotics / Q000097:blood / Q000652:urine; D010865:Pilot Projects; D012025:Reflex, Pupillary; D015813:Substance Abuse Detection / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology
chemical_list: D002492:Central Nervous System Depressants; D020719:Glucuronides; D009294:Narcotics; D000431:Ethanol