International Profile

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Background

The National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC) is a premier research institution in Australia and is recognised internationally as a Research Centre of Excellence. The overall mission of NDARC is to conduct high quality research and related activities that increase the effectiveness of Australian and international treatment and other intervention responses to alcohol and other drug related harm. NDARC researchers make a substantial contribution to the international drug and alcohol academic literature.

The Centre is multidisciplinary and collaborates with a range of institutions and individuals in Australia and overseas including the World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM).

Epidemiology and interventions: NDARC is active internationally, particularly in the Asia and Pacific Region, in strengthening regional drug monitoring programs, leading epidemiological work, and have been key players in a number of projects evaluating effective interventions to address drug and alcohol problems.

Drug policy: The Drug Policy Modelling Program (DPMP) is aimed at increasing the evidence base for drug policy and has a number of international collaborations in policy analysis.

Training and capacity development: NDARC provides training and capacity development in the Asia and Pacific Region through its Program of International Research and Training (PIRT). PIRT trains health care workers and researchers in drug treatment, HIV prevention and research practice.

Areas of expertise

NDARC employs over 100 staff. Technical expertise within the centre covers a wide range of research areas including:

Future directions

• Develop new methods for documenting and analysing world drug trends
• Assess the role of illicit drugs and associated problems in contributing to major classes of disease (e.g. cancer)
• Develop innovative delivery of education and interventions for alcohol and drug related problems internationally
• Conduct international comparative policy analyses

Examples of current international projects

Examples of completed international projects

Drug monitoring and rapid assessments

• Improving amphetamine type stimulant data and information systems in the Asia-Pacific Region
• Rapid assessment of HIV and drug use in prison in Indonesia
• Rapid assessment of HIV and drug use in Mongolia
• Rapid assessment of HIV and drug use in Mauritius
• Review of drug injection and HIV in prison in developing countries

Intervention and policy analysis

• Incorporating harm reduction measures into abstinence-based therapeutic communities
• Agonist pharmacotherapies for drug dependence treatment in prisons
• The effectiveness of HIV interventions for young and new injectors
• International review on the effectiveness of interventions for marginalized and particularly vulnerable IDUs such as prisoners, sex workers, gay injectors and indigenous people
• Review of HIV prevention, care and treatment services in prisons in South-East Asian countries
• Drug treatment in prisons: a review of the literature on drug-free units, detoxification and maintenance prescribing
• Policy framework: reducing risks, harms and costs of injection drug use (IDU) and HIV/AIDS among women and prisoners
• The impact of Portugal’s decriminalisation of drugs

Education and training

• Training on dissemination of research findings: Indonesia
  
• Training on drug treatment and HIV Prevention: Taiwan
  
• Study tours for delegations from: Malaysian Ministry of Health; Taiwanese Justice and Health Ministries; Indonesian Health and Prison officials; Vietnamese Ministry of Health and AIDS Control
  
• Development and delivery of a training session on harm minimisation: Cambodia
  
• Development of WHO drug detoxification and treatment guidelines for closed settings in South East Asia

Key international staff

Professor Louisa Degenhardt

BA (Hons) (Psych), MPscychol (Clinical), PhD

Louisa is the chief investigator on a number of projects monitoring trends in illicit drug use, availability and harm across Australia. These include the Illicit Drug Reporting System (IDRS), the Ecstasy and Related Drugs Reporting System (EDRS) and the National Illicit Drug Indicators Project (NIDIP). Louisa is also an investigator on a large case control study, funded by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), examining potential gene-environment interactions between childhood trauma and the later development of heroin dependence. She is currently involved in several international projects including the WHO’s World Mental Health Survey Initiative, the Secretariat to the Reference Group advising the United Nations on Injecting Drug use and HIV, and the WHO’s Global Burden of Disease project. Her major areas of research involve the epidemiology of illicit drug use and related harm (nationally and internationally); research on ecstasy and other related drugs; comorbidity between drug use and mental health problems; and surveillance of illicit drug markets. Louisa is a member of several editorial boards (International Journal of Drug Policy, Drug and Alcohol Review and BMC Psychiatry) and is a reviewer for 20 national/international journals.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0230
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Associate Professor Kate Dolan

BSc, PhD

Kate has studied blood borne viruses since 1984. With others she started Australia’s first needle and syringe exchange program in November 1986. Since then she has conducted numerous studies investigating the transmission and prevention of blood borne viral infections in England and Australia. Her main areas of research interests are drug treatment and the prevention of blood borne viral infections in prison, drug injecting and drug treatment in developing countries, needle and syringe programs, methadone treatment and injecting rooms. She established the Program of International Research and Training (PIRT) at NDARC in 2003. PIRT aims to build capacity among the treatment and research sectors in developing countries. PIRT has undertaken 11 projects so far in countries such as Iran, Indonesia, Taiwan, Vietnam and China.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0333
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Associate Professor Chris Doran

BEc(Hons), PhD

Chris has recently relocated to the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (UNSW) from the University of Queensland where he was the lead health economist at the Centre for Burden of Disease and Cost-Effectiveness. His main research interest is in economic evaluation of health care interventions. Chris has been awarded over $20 million in research funding over the past 10 years. He is currently leading a large Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) funded capacity building grant in the area of health economics and is a chief investigator on several other NHMRC and AERF grants. Chris has been undertaking research for a range of multilateral organisations including the World Health Organization, United Nations and Secretariat of the South Pacific. He is currently conducting a situational analysis on drugs, crime and corruption in Laos for the UNODC and is working with the Health Promotion Board, Ministry of Health in Singapore to evaluate the Singapore Tobacco Control program.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0324
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Associate Professor Alison Ritter

BA (Hons), MA(Clin Psych), PhD, MAPS

Alison is the director of a major illicit drug policy research program, the Drug Policy Modelling Program in collaboration with scholars from the Australian National University, Turning Point Alcohol and Drug Centre and Griffith University School of Criminology. The goal of the work is to advance illicit drug policy through improving the evidence-base, developing new policy decision-making tools and understanding the best mix of policy options (law enforcement, prevention, treatment and harm reduction) and the ways in which these different policy options dynamically interact. Internationally, Alison is Vice President of the International Society for the Study of Drug Policy (ISSDP), an associate on the Comparative Analysis Research in Illicit Drugs in the European Union and a coordinator of the International Collaboration Network on Drug Harm Indexes which aims to develop better coordination of drug harm indexes across the world.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0236
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Dr John Howard

BA, MA(Couns), MClinPsych, DipCrim, PhD, MAPS

John joined NDARC in 2008 as a Senior Lecturer and works with the National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre, as well as NDARC's international research activities and those with a focus on young people. He was a member of the Technical Steering Committee of the WHO’s Department of Child and Adolescent Health and Development (CAH) for 6 years. From 1992 he consulted to CAH, UNICEF, UNODC and the Arab Council on Childhood and Development, on street youth/children in developing countries and the health of male adolescents. He conducted field-work on this issue in India, Philippines, South Africa and Egypt whilst working at WHO/HQ in Geneva between 1992 and 2004. Since 1999 he has consulted to UNESCAP, with field-work in Lao PDR, Vietnam, China and Thailand on capacity-building for the community treatment of young drug users. His major clinical, teaching and research areas are: adolescent substance use and ‘street youth’ (in both developed and developing countries), comorbidity, depression and suicide in young people, working with marginalised youth, adolescent psychotherapy, same-sex attracted youth, HIV infection in adolescents, resilience, and treatment capacity-building.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0303
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Dr Rebecca McKetin

BSc Psychol (Hons), PhD

Rebecca holds an academic position at NDARC as a Conjoint Psychostimulant Research Fellow. She completed her PhD on methamphetamine use at NDARC in 1998, and has since managed the Illicit Drug Reporting System, and worked on the development of drug information systems in Africa and Asia through the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. She returned to NDARC in 2003 to manage a program of research on methamphetamine-related harms and treatment interventions. Rebecca has an interest in in-direct prevalence estimation techniques, and was the recipient of a UNSW John Yu Fellowship to Europe to pursue this research in collaboration with Imperial College, London. She also has worked with the United Nations Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) to develop a system to monitor Amphetamine-type Stimulant use in the East Asia and Pacific region. She has served as an advisor on a number of psychostimulant-related research projects and continues to provide technical assistance to the UNODC on ATS-related issues. Rebecca, along with other NDARC staff, has also been working collaboratively with the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0333
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Dr Anjalee Cohen

BA (Hons), PhD

Anjalee joined NDARC in February 2008. She is employed as a research fellow and is the coordinator for the centre’s international research activities. She completed a PhD in Anthropology at Macquarie University, Sydney, in 2006. Her PhD examined youth culture and identity in northern Thailand, focussing particularly on the social and cultural context of methamphetamine use. Prior to her appointment at NDARC, she worked at the Brain and Mind Research Institute of the University of Sydney, where she conducted qualitative research on youth mental health issues. Anjalee’s research interests include medical anthropology, youth culture and risk behaviour, drug use across cultures, youth methamphetamine use in Southeast Asia, and drug tourism.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0358
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Dr Bradley Mathers

MSD, MBChB

Bradley joined NDARC in 2006 as a Senior Research Officer working on the Program of International Research and Training (PIRT). Bradley has a background in medicine and drug and alcohol work and has an interest in international social development. He is currently coordinating the Secretariat for the Reference Group to the United Nations on HIV and injecting drug use and is also working on a project developing and evaluating specialist services for female drug users in Iran.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0176
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Sarah Larney

BA, BSc (Hons)

Sarah joined NDARC as a Research Officer in April 2005 and has been involved in projects in diverse areas including drug use in prison, service provision for homeless alcohol and drug dependent persons and HIV prevention in the Asia-Pacific region, including Vietnam, China, Indonesia and Thailand. She is currently undertaking a PhD in the area of methadone maintenance treatment in institutional settings in South-East Asia.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0160
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222

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Benjamin Phillips

BSocSc (Hons)

Benjamin joined NDARC in 2007 as a Research Officer part of the Secretariat for the Reference Group to the United Nations on HIV and injecting drug use. Benjamin has a background in drug and alcohol work. He has worked on projects on HIV prevention in the Asia-Pacific region and has been compiling key publications for the International Harm Reduction Association. Benjamin has an interest in medical anthropology and is currently a Masters candidate.

Contact details:

Telephone: 61 2 9385 0264
Fax No: 61 2 9385 0222