In order to assist countries enhance their drug abuse information systems, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, together with experts from other international organizations and national drug information systems, have produced this Toolkit Module 8—Guidance for the measurement of drug treatment demand. This module, building also on the Joint Pompidou Group—EMCDDA Treatment Demand Indicator Protocol, provides experts and practitioners in the field of treatment services with concrete guidelines for establishing and managing systems for the collection of treatment demand data.

The aim is to improve common standards for data collection and monitoring. This should enable a more uniform approach around the world, provide a clearer picture of drug trends and facilitate comparative analysis. The evidence that is collected should improve our capacity to measure drug treatment demand and respond accordingly with effective demand reduction programmes and projects.