Urine| Hair Follicle | Oral Fluid | Blood | ETG
Hair tests are recognized as an effective means for identifying drug and alcohol consumption. The hair strands archive a comprehensive record of drug and alcohol use by embedding biomarkers within their structure. When cut near the scalp, hair samples can reveal substance usage over an estimated three-month duration. Its collection process is straightforward, making altering results a challenge, and it is convenient to transport.
A sample length of 1.5 inches containing roughly 200 strands (comparable to a #2 pencil's diameter) obtained nearest the scalp yields 100mg of hair, which is optimal for both screening and confirmation tests. For EtG, supplementary testing, and/or panels exceeding ten, a 150mg specimen is preferable. It is advisable to use a jeweler’s scale to weigh the sample. In the absence of scalp hair, an equivalent quantity of body hair can be gathered. When discussing head hair, we refer explicitly to scalp strands. Body hair encompasses all other forms (facial, underarm, etc.).
Process Overview
There are four primary stages in the laboratory handling of a drug test: Accessioning, Screening, Extraction, and Confirmation.
During Accessioning, a sample is registered within the lab's framework. This phase ensures the sample was properly sealed and transported, assigns a unique LAN (Laboratory Accessioning Number), and finalizes any ancillary data input absent from an electronic chain of custody system.
Screening is an initial rapid assessment for substance misuse. While it's a budget-friendly approach for dismissing drug involvement in the majority of cases, any positive findings must undergo confirmation to be legally valid. Samples testing positive in Screening necessitate a follow-up confirmation.
Should a screening suggest drug presence, further hair is extracted from the original sample for Extraction. Here, drugs are separated from hair at much lower concentrations compared to other techniques (e.g., urine or saliva), making hair analysis particularly challenging.
Confirmation tests of positive screening results are performed using GC/MS, GC/MS/MS, or LC/MS/MS. Before confirmation, all likely positive samples receive a wash if necessary. The end-to-end lab procedure from Accessioning to Confirmation adheres to both CAP (College of American Pathologists) Hair standards and ISO / IEC 17025 accreditation.
Advantages of hair drug testing:
Limitations:
Note: Although often termed "hair follicle tests", the analysis focuses on the hair strand itself rather than the follicle beneath the scalp
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