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Abstract
This review summarizes the latest literature on “party” or “club” drugs, defined as MDMA, GHB, ketamine, and Rohypnol, as published from 2002 to early 2005. Club drugs have been categorized as being used at raves and dance parties. The literature shows that each drug has different properties, users, and settings. Each drug has different adverse effects and requires different acute care protocols. Although these drugs were identified early, scientific information about them, including the toxicological tests to identify them, is still evolving. Increasing numbers of studies on the short- and long-term effects of these drugs on humans are being published, but because of limitations on research using human subjects, they may not always be as rigorous as desired and can be cited by drug users to discredit findings of harm. The lack of research-based information on these drugs has led to the emergence of web sites that may or may not provide accurate data. Evaluated chemical dependency treatment protocols using the latest research for each of these different drugs are needed.
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Jane Carlisle Maxwell
Jane Carlisle Maxwell, Ph.D., is a Research Professor at the School of Social Work at the University of Texas at Austin, where she is co-investigator on a grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse and is director of the Center for Excellence in Club Drug Epidemiology of the Gulf Coast Addiction Technology Transfer Center. She is a member of the National Advisory Council of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the Drug Advisory Committee of the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, and the National Institute on Drug Abuse's Community and Border Epidemiology Work Groups. She has been an Australian Commonwealth National Drug Strategy Research Fellow and has received a Fulbright Senior Specialist grant. Prior to her move to the University of Texas, Dr. Maxwell was chief of research at the Texas Commissionon Alcohol and Drug Abuse, where her research group produced a number of school, household, and juvenile and criminal justice surveys. In addition, Dr. Maxwell and her group were instrumental in building a nationally recognized client data system that collects admission, discharge, and follow-up data on treatment clients.