The Most Popular Drug Test Cheats your Employees could be using.
There are a number of methods that people faced with a urine drug test can and will use to try to avoid a positive reading. These methods include substitution, dilution, or taking screening substances. These methods are all commonly used and readily available. If you conduct drug and alcohol use testing at your workplace, club or home, then you should be aware of them.
Substitution:
The candidate for testing may bring a “clean” sample from someone else and substitute that sample during the testing procedure. Many devices are commercially available to assist in this deception, or the sample can just be hidden in a vial or tube, and substituted at the appropriate time.
Attempts at Dilution:
Here the person to be tested will drink excess amounts of water, or other fluids before the test, or place extra fluid into the sample from say a bathroom faucet or even the toilet. The extra fluid can dilute the sample and reduce the concentration of any drugs that maybe present.
Screening Substances:
There are a number of commercial screening substances available, mostly online. These purport to hide or mask the presence of drugs in the urine sample, and may be claimed by the user to be vitamins, herbs and minerals, taken for legitimate reasons such as fluid retention or weight loss. Caffeinated drinks such as coke and coffee, or herbal solutions like Uva Ursi, Goldenseal, or Dandelion Root can be taken in large quantities, and combined with a fasting diet, are claimed to cleanse the drug metabolites from the users system.
Many other “cheats” are also known to be used, with varying degrees of success. Some will place over the counter items such as eye drops into the sample in an effort to interfere with the results. Drinking vinegar before the test to change the pH of the sample, and so cover the presence of drugs is commonly reported. Soap and salt are also used.
This addition of foreign substances may change the quality of the sample and make the reading of the drug test more difficult.
The Best Ways to Thwart Cheating:
As these attempts to cheat are now well known, most are detected during the sample taking or at the lab. However there are some things you can do to minimize these actions.
Drug test at random times, and announce the testing immediately before the event only. Make sure the drug testing areas are clear of soaps and any other solutions, which can be used as adulterants. Monitor the employee as the sample is provided, and ensure that all coats and bags are left outside the drug testing area. Use blue colored water in the toilet to make it unsuitable for dilution. Get employees to wash their hands before entering the drug sampling area, and do not allow them to go anywhere except the drug testing area once they have been notified that testing is to occur.
You should also consider your hiring strategy. More information is available.
The introduction of Hair Follicle Testing overcomes many of these problems, and so now this method of testing is fast replacing urine tests. Read more on Hair Follicle Tests.