Urine| Hair Follicle | Oral Fluid | Blood | ETG
Hair testing is recognized as a highly effective method for identifying drug and alcohol consumption. Hair offers a prolonged historical record of drugs and alcohol by embedding biomarkers within its expanding strands. When procured near the scalp, hair can reveal up to a 3-month window for detecting alcohol and drugs. Its collection is straightforward, modification challenging, and shipping hassle-free.
A 1.5-inch segment consisting of roughly 200 hair strands (comparable to a #2 pencil) adjacent to the scalp provides 100mg of hair, the optimal quantity for assessing and confirming. For EtG, add-ons, or tests exceeding 10 panels, a 150mg specimen is advisable. Using a jeweler's scale is recommended. In the absence of scalp hair, an equivalent portion of body hair may be used. By head hair, we exclusively mean scalp hair, while body hair includes all other hair types (such as facial and axillary).
Process Overview
The principal stages in lab processing of drug test results are Accessioning, Screening, Extraction, and Confirmation.
Accessioning entails the preliminary integration of a sample into a lab's framework. This step confirms the sample was securely sealed and dispatched, allocates a random LAN (Laboratory Accessioning Number), and enters any extra information not available from an electronic chain of custody system.
Screening is a rapid preliminary assessment for substance abuse. Despite its cost-efficiency to eliminate drug use in most samples, a positive screen necessitates confirmation for legal acceptance. Presumptive positives in Screening necessitate secondary validation.
Should a sample be presumptively positive during Screening, extra hair is extracted from the original sample for Extraction. Here, drugs extract from hair at much lower concentrations than other approaches (e.g., urine or oral fluid), hence hair drug screening presents a greater challenge.
Any confirmed positive screening result is verified through GC/MS, GC/MS/MS, or LC/MS/MS. Samples with presumptive positives undergo a wash before confirmation if required. The complete lab process from Accessioning to Confirmation is evaluated under both the CAP (College of American Pathologists) Hair designation and ISO / IEC 17025 accreditation criteria.
Advantages of hair drug testing:
Limitations:
Note: Although often called "hair follicle tests", these tests examine the hair strand rather than the follicle beneath the scalp.
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