All About Urine Drug Testing

Urine drug testing can be used for many different purposes such as employment screening for new hires, used by law enforcement, or even by educational institutions to test students participating in after school activities.  Further, some employers require regularly scheduled or random drug testing for current employees.  Many drugs can stay in our body for days, weeks, or even months. So, what are some sure ways to pass a drug test?  One answer is with a synthetic urine kit.  To learn more about how these can help you pass a test, let’s dig deeper into this urine drug test.

How Do Urine Drug Tests Work?

Typically, drugs can be detected through either a urine drug test or through a hair test.  During the urine test, a sample of urine is collected and tested to determine the use of drugs.  Drug testing does not directly look for the presence of the drug, but rather the metabolites of the drug.  This means the drug test is looking for evidence that your body has metabolized the drug.  Many companies will opt for a drug screen rather than a drug test.  Screening is typically cheaper however, can often produce false positives.  The main difference between testing and screening is that a drug screen simply looks for the presence of a drug.  Because of this many legal drugs, such as ibuprofen, will trigger a positive result indicating drug use.  During the test, the donor will be asked to provide a sample of urine in a laboratory or medical office setting.  The urine is then packaged and tested.

What Drugs are Detected?

An employer can set up a drug test designed to screen for any number of drugs, both legal and illegal.  Some of the drugs that are commonly detected through urine drug testing include:

  • Amphetamines
  • Benzodiazepines
  • Methamphetamines
  • Marijuana
  • Cocaine
  • PCP
  • Opioids

It is important to note that many legal drugs will still appear on a drug test.  If you are on a prescription medication that may create a positive test it is important to notify your employer.  Further, drug testing is able to determine if a person is abusing legal medications.

Ways to Pass a Urine Drug Test

Depending on the type of test you are taking, using synthetic urine is a sure way to pass a urine drug test.  Many drugs can stay in the body for weeks, or even a month at a time.  Synthetic urine is used in place of your own urine. Today, synthetic urine is so sophisticated that even testing in a laboratory setting using gas-chromatography mass spectrometry, also called a GC-MS test, is unable to detect the difference between natural and synthetic urine.