Conceptual medical abstract, rainbow coloured. Binary code and wave lengths. Credit: AdobeStock

The Methamphetamine and Injecting Drug Use Cohort Study (MIXMAX)

The challenge

Injecting drug use and methamphetamine smoking are the two forms of drug use linked to the majority of illicit drug related harms in Australia. Through MIXMAX, we will transform our understanding of the health needs of people who use drugs and the impact of interventions in the context of major drug market upheavals and service innovations such as supervised injecting facilities. At the forefront of research into drug use globally, the project brings together world-leading researchers on drug use from Australia, the UK and Canada to provide fundamental evidence to drive policy and practice over the coming decade.

The project

The project will provide evidence to answer key questions about effective responses to reduce harms related to injection drug use and methamphetamine smoking including 1) establishing the incidence of key clinical outcomes, including mortality, poor mental health, overdose, bloodborne viral infections, injecting-related injuries and diseases, and chronic diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; 2) determining the effectiveness of existing and novel health service interventions, such as drug treatment, take-home naloxone and supervised injecting facilities on improving health outcomes and supporting long-term cessation from drug use; and 3) evaluating the impacts of structural factors (e.g. homelessness, imprisonment) on these outcomes.

The method

We will combine and harmonise our two established cohort studies (SuperMIX, N=1300+) and people who smoke methamphetamine (VMAX, N=850+). Our cohorts are highly characterised, enabling analysis of fundamental confounders and, unlike primary studies, are powered to detect impacts of interventions such as OAT on drug-related harms. We will measure individual, population and service-level factors associated with harms, including: 1) morbidity and disease incidence, including non-fatal overdose, COVID-19 infection, vaccine uptake and hospitalisation, lung function, liver disease, inflammation, BBVs and STIs, 2) mental health and wellbeing, and 3) mortality incidence, including from overdose, suicide and other acute and drug-related causes.

The impact

We anticipate that by providing unique data drawn from the Australian rural and metropolitan context our results will inform and refine priority responses to prevent drug-related harms over the coming decade.

Project collaborators