In this episode, Lillian Erdahl, MD, FACS, is joined by Jordan Rook, MD, from UCLA, and Lorraine Kelley-Quon, MD, FACS, from Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and Keck School of Medicine of USC. They discuss Drs Rook and Kelley-Quon’s recent article, “Expanding the Public Health Role of Pediatric Trauma Centers: Drug Screening for Adolescent Trauma Patients,” in which the authors found that biochemical drug screening for injured adolescents is decreasing at pediatric trauma centers, despite increasing national adolescent overdose deaths. Given high rates of substance use among injured adolescents, this is a missed opportunity to intervene on problematic substance use and prevent future adolescent overdose deaths.

Disclosure Information: Drs Rook, Kelley-Quon, and Erdahl have nothing to disclose.

Rook, Jordan M MDa,b; Spurrier, Ryan G MD FACSc,d; Lee, Jenna S MDc; Safavi, Arash MD MHSC FACSc,d; Barrington-Trimis, Jessica PhDe; Ignacio, Romeo C MD MS MPath FACSf; Juillard, Catherine J MD MPH FACSa; Kelley-Quon, Lorraine I MD MS FACSc,d,e. Expanding the Public Health Role of Pediatric Trauma Centers: Drug Screening for Adolescent Trauma Patients. Journal of the American College of Surgeons ():10.1097/XCS.0000000000001596, August 22, 2025. | DOI: 10.1097/XCS.0000000000001596 

Learn more about the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, a monthly peer-reviewed journal publishing original contributions on all aspects of surgery, including scientific articles, collective reviews, experimental investigations, and more.

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