Development & Characteristics of the Provincial Overdose Cohort in B.C. (Jan 2019)

Cases

Cases are people included in the BC-ODC who experienced a drug poisoning since January 1, 2015. This period was the beginning of the rapid rise in unregulated drug poisoning events and deaths in B.C.

An overdose event is defined by any of the following:

• Administration of the opioid antagonist, Naloxone, by paramedics
• Physician-diagnosed opioid drug poisoning at an emergency department
• Coroner-determined illicit drug toxicity death
• A visit to a hospital, emergency department, or physician with an associated drug poisoning diagnosis code
• Vital Statistics drug poisoning death

Drug poisoning events can show up in several datasets. For example, a drug poisoning record may be in ambulance, emergency, and hospital datasets. These events are grouped to prevent over-counting of drug poisonings.

Controls

Controls are people used as a comparison group for the BC-ODC. The Control group is selected from a 20% random sample of the B.C. population. Like cases, health and prescribing histories are available for this group.

A matched control group is also available. Previous BC-ODC analyses have matched people on birth year, sex, and Local Health Area of residence.

Research Outputs of the BC Provincial Overdose Cohort

The BC Provincial Overdose Cohort (BC-ODC) is a collection of information on people who had a drug poisoning event (overdose). The BC-ODC is focused on using data for action to prevent overdose-related harms and deaths. It has been used to support many research projects and the findings of this research are shared on this page.

Analyses with the BC-ODC have been guided by a prioritization exercise co-led by partners, including people with lived experience of substance use and overdose. The outputs of research on the BC-ODC are shared below, organized by priority alignment area.

Click on the name of the study to access the publication online.​