Urine| Hair Follicle | Oral Fluid | Blood | ETG
Regarded as a robust mechanism, hair analysis is instrumental in detecting alcohol and drug consumption. Hair captures a comprehensive history of substances by embedding biomarkers within its fibers as it grows. When samples are gathered near the scalp, they offer a detection timeframe extending up to three months for alcohol and other substances. This method is straightforward to collect, hard to tamper with, and convenient for shipping.
An ideal sample for testing consists of a 1.5-inch section of approximately 200 hair strands (comparable to the width of a #2 pencil) cut closest to the scalp, yielding 100mg of hair suitable for both screening and confirmation. For EtG, additional tests, or those exceeding 10 panels, a 150mg sample is advised. It's best to measure the sample's weight using a jeweler’s scale. Should there be no scalp hair, a similar quantity of body hair may be substituted. "Head hair" specifically denotes scalp hair, whereas "body hair" encompasses all other varieties (such as facial or axillary hair).
Process Overview
The drug testing lab analysis encompasses four pivotal steps: Accessioning, Screening, Extraction, and Confirmation.
Accessioning marks the initial step, where a sample is logged into the lab’s system. This procedure includes confirming proper sealing and shipping of the sample, allocating a random Laboratory Accessioning Number (LAN), and completing any non-electronic data entries not encompassed by a chain of custody system.
Screening executes a preliminary rapid evaluation for potential drug presence. This stage is cost-effective for negating drug usage in the majority of samples; however, results indicating a positive need further confirmation to be court-admissible. Samples deemed presumptively positive through Screening proceed to a secondary verification.
Should a sample test presumptively positive during Screening, additional strands from the initial sample are subjected to Extraction. This stage extracts drugs at much lower concentrations from hair compared to other methods such as urine or oral fluids, rendering hair drug testing one of the more complex methodologies to perform.
Subsequent Confirmation of any initial positive result is performed using GC/MS, GC/MS/MS, or LC/MS/MS. All samples testing presumptively positive undergo a pre-confirmation wash as necessary. The extensive laboratory procedure, from Accessioning to Confirmation, is conducted under the supervision of both the CAP (College of American Pathologists) Hair specialization and the ISO / IEC 17025 accreditation standards.
Advantages of hair drug testing:
Limitations:
Note: Although commonly termed "hair follicle tests," the analysis is conducted on the hair strand itself, not the follicle located under the scalp.
Hair follicle testing outperforms urine testing in Broussard, LA due to its superior detection accuracy and reliability.
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