Scientia Professor Louisa Degenhardt stands as a preeminent figure in public health research with specialized expertise in substance use epidemiology and policy. She currently serves as Deputy Director of the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre at UNSW Sydney while holding the prestigious title of Scientia Professor, representing UNSW's highest academic rank. As an NHMRC Senior Principal Research Fellow, Professor Degenhardt maintains a distinguished research profile supported by sustained competitive funding and methodological excellence. Her academic leadership extends through honorary appointments at the University of Melbourne's School of Population and Global Health, Murdoch Children's Research Institute, and University of Washington's Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation.
Professor Degenhardt has established herself as a world leader through her extensive scholarly output of over 560 peer-reviewed publications, 120 technical reports and monographs, three books, and 45 book chapters. Her research portfolio encompasses diverse methodological approaches including large-scale community surveys, data linkage studies of individuals with drug dependence or chronic pain, and longitudinal cohort investigations that have significantly advanced understanding of substance use patterns and consequences. She pioneered the expansion of the Ecstasy and related Drugs Reporting System into a national surveillance framework in 2003, creating a vital monitoring tool that has informed evidence-based drug policy for two decades. Her influential work on opioid treatment outcomes, drug overdose epidemiology, and international comparative studies has been widely cited, reflected in her impressive H-index of 80 in Scopus and 104 in Google Scholar.
Beyond her individual research achievements, Professor Degenhardt has shaped the field through her leadership of major national cohort studies including the POINT study tracking pharmaceutical opioid use for chronic pain management. Her current research program extends to understanding risk behavior trajectories among young people through both local and national cohort investigations. Professor Degenhardt's methodological rigor and commitment to generating policy-relevant evidence have made her work instrumental in guiding Australia's public health response to substance use issues. As she continues to lead innovative research at NDARC, her focus remains on translating epidemiological findings into practical interventions that reduce the health and social harms associated with drug use across diverse populations.
