Why Move From Urine Testing To Our Hair Test?

Urine misses many chronic drug users.

Organizations who switch from urine testing to Psychemedics are often shocked at the actual level of drug use in their employee or applicant pool. Why?  Our detection rate is unrivaled. We detect six-to-ten more users for every one that urine identifies.

Beyond our unrivaled detection rate, Psychemedics captures 90-days of drug usage.

A urine test is a snapshot into usage over a very short period of time. Why? Its short “Window of Detection” which is the amount of time a test can reliably detect drug usage.  For a urine test it is a few days.  Only a few. Your biggest risks—habitual and chronic users—can slip under the radar simply by abstaining for a few days if they know the test is coming.

For Psychemedics, that Window of Detection is not days.  It is a few months.

Cheating the test by abstaining for a few days is impossible. You will catch those high-risk applicants or employees.

Urine testing is an ineffective pre-employment screen.

The goal of pre-employment testing is to eliminate applicants who regularly use drugs. They burden organizations with significant risks and costs. The low positive rates and short window-of-detection for a urine test means applicants will abstain, beat the test and you will add chronic drug users to your talent pool. Not with a Psychemedics hair test.

Our detection rate is unrivaled by any drug test.  And eclipses urine.

To identify habitual users nothing is better than Psychemedics. Only Psychemedics’ patented technology releases virtually 100% of the drugs trapped in the hair to be analyzed. Nobody else does that and it is a big reason for our Unrivaled Detection rate.

Plus…we capture 90 days of usage patterns, enabling you to screen for habitual users and thwart short-term abstinence as an evasion tactic.

All the while detecting up 6-10X more users.

For most organizations the objective of a drug testing program is to reduce costs and risks by identifying drug users.  And the true measure of ROI is what it costs to identify each user. A positive result on a drug test is the indicator and Psychemedics has the lowest cost-per-positive result in the industry.

Why?  Our detection rate. It determines the cost-per-positive result.

How?  Take the total cost of testing and divide by the number of users identified. That is the cost-per-positive.  You pay up to 6X less to identify a user with Psychemedics than with a urine test.

The lowest cost for each user found.  Better ROI.

Google “How can I cheat a urine test?” and you will find a cottage industry is out there ready to help people who use drugs skate into organizations that rely on urine testing as their only screening method. Tactics are openly shared,  well known and often used.

Those tactics include abstaining from drug usage for a few days,  substituting urine with a sample mixed from concentrate or provided by a third party, diluting urine with excessive intake of water prior to the test, or adulterating a sample with chemicals designed to mask drugs.  Most rely on the person providing the sample being out of sight of the collector.

Sample collection for a Psychemedics hair test is fully observed so tampering is not possible. And because our detection window is 90-days, short term abstinence is not an evasion tactic that works.

By comparing two hair test results, a balanced picture of use can be further validated. And that is crucial when defending against a challenged result. Because Psychemedics detects drug usage over a wide window of time, two samples collected close in time to one another provide independent snapshots of that long detection window. And that gives you balanced validation that trumps a habitual user’s challenge.

A short detection window makes this impossible for a urine test.

A Psychemedics hair test for drugs requires a small sample taken from the head or body that is then analyzed using our patented technology. The collection process is simple, quick, and is completely non-invasive. Unlike a test using urine, there is no need for private facilities and the collection is fully observed.

A sample of hair approximately the size around of a number two pencil lead is snipped from above the scalp. The hair follicle is not disturbed and there is virtually no cosmetic indication of the sample being taken. It is just that simple.

No trauma.   No drama. 

Because hair records drug use chronologically, the Psychemedics test can also approximate the pattern and quantity of drug use.

A urine test cannot do that. It misses important pieces of the puzzle.

What does this mean to you? It means you have a chronological record that lets you identify those users who habitually use drugs. And those users pose the greatest risks and costs to your organization.

And a urine test won’t do that.

Because it can’t.

For an industry-leading trucking firm Department of Transportation (DOT) urinalysis testing failed to have an impact on impaired driving. The positive rates for post-accident urinalysis tests remained high, an indicator that drivers were evading detection on the DOT-mandated applicant and random tests using urine. Managers correctly surmised that if they could identify and remove habitual drug users from their workforce or avoid hiring those users the post-accident rates would fall.

The company implemented Psychemedics for pre-employment and random testing and the results were immediate and sustained. Post-accident positive results on standard urinalysis tests dropped to nearly nothing. And more importantly, results on DOT random urine testing fell dramatically and has been sustained at a level 60% lower than what it was when Psychemedics was implemented.

Why?  When applicants or drivers are aware that Psychemedics is the test, behaviors change.

Certainty of Detection is the Best Deterrent.

In an industry where safety is paramount, and the use of contractors is common, the workforce is extremely fluid as projects start and complete. One large oil refinery concerned about managing the risks in their operations wanted to ensure that contractors were as well vetted as the employees working in this safety sensitive environment.

In a move toward that goal the company extended its  Psychemedics hair drug testing program beyond employees, to include the thousands of contractors that accessed the site.

Switching the contractor testing from urinalysis to hair testing resulted in the lowest drug positive rates and incident rates they had ever achieved. How? A more comprehensive view of drug usage allowed the company to identify habitual or chronic drug users and keep them off their sites and out of safety sensitive positions.

And mirroring the success of this refinery, over 4,000 major oil companies and contractors now test with Psychemedics to ensure safer workplaces and lower the costs that accompany the risks and liabilities of drug usage in safety sensitive industries.

For businesses that cater to consumers, image is everything. And impaired employees not only bring higher costs and risks to operations, they can damage the customer experience. And for these companies, that higher incidence of abuse brings with it a host of issues including customer complaints, excessive absenteeism, and workplace theft.

For one casino, all the risks weren’t being taken by the bettors at the tables.

They had multiple issues related to substance abuse on their properties that threatened operations and customer satisfaction. Pre-employment urinalysis testing was not helping them screen out drug users. Recognizing that a drug-free workforce starts with drug-free hiring, they modified their pre-employment process to include Psychemedics hair testing.

The result?  The 90-day window of detection literally closed the window on cheating a test and enabled them to screen out habitual drug users who pose the most risk to their business. And they are one of many gaming firms that rely on us today.

One food company was seeing a 1.5% positive rate on pre-employment screens that relied on urine testing. But as with many organizations they correctly theorized that many substance abusers might simply be evading detection through well-known substitution, flushing, chemical altering or abstinence tactics. They knew that the first step to improving the safety of their workplace by making it drug-free was to hire drug-free.

After learning of the 90-day detection window and the fact that sample collection was fully observed, they realized they could eliminate cheating and moved to Psychemedics.

Immediately the positive rate for pre-employment tests jumped to 8.6% meaning they were better uncovering large numbers of drug users who previously had gone undetected. Because drug users are 3.5X more likely to cause or be involved in a workplace accident, identifying these high-risk people before they were hired helped them lower their incident rate and reduce workplace injuries—all keys to lowering overall costs.

When the District Attorney of this large city noticed that a high number of cases his office prosecuted were young drug offenders, he decided to do something about it. In his words “By the time they are in front of my office, it is too late.”

In partnership with a like-minded educator and concerned parents the city and school implemented a Psychemedics drug testing program that is a model for collaboration between Education and Law Enforcement. Parents and students were informed that testing would begin after a summer break and the results were impressive. Students took the program seriously and had a socially acceptable out when pressured by peers to use drugs. In the words of one educator “They say my school hair tests so I have to say no.”

Similar programs have been instituted by schools around the nation with reports of higher ACT scores, more athletic titles, increased service hours and fewer disciplinary reports in the full year following program implementation.

Certainty of Detection is the Best Deterrent. (and a great reason to just say “no”.)