Can I beat a drug test and pass?

Natch, the best way to pass drug testing is not to do drugs at all or at least lay off them for awhile before testing. But the problem with employee random drug testing is, you don't know when your employer will pull your name from the hat. Your employer might not be required by law to give you much advanced notice, as that obviously blows the whole idea. Even with advanced notice, drug testing can detect drugs for days to weeks, depending on the drug, frequency of use, specimen and test type, metabolism, and other factors.

How long you need to lay off drugs depends on which resource you consult, as few agree. For example, one of the two companies selling home drug-testing kits with which this writer checked, reported that marijuana use may be detected for up to 4 weeks. The second reported that marijuana may be detected for up to 11 weeks, while the National Institute on Drug Abuse reported up to 5 weeks. Huge discrepancy!

There are many techniques floating around for flushing your body free of drugs or tricking the tests by loading up on herbs, certain foods, magic detoxifier pills, coffee, etc. There are more about spiking your specimen with adulterants. But many are myths.

For example, there is speculation that loading up on water before a urine drug test might dilute drugs and metabolites just enough, to put them below the cutoff levels. But, lots of water makes your urine look pale. It's a healthy sign that you're well-hydrated, but also a waving flag that you might have tried to "flush." NORML, a group working to reform marijuana laws, suggests that you might be able to beat watery-urine detection "visually" if you also take vitamin B-2, which tints your urine yellow.

See the sidebar for more of NORML's tips, but don't get too excited about them just yet. For one thing, labs have the option to conduct specimen-validity tests at their discretion. For another, on August 21, 2001, SAMHSA introduced a proposal to standardize and require urine validity tests across the board, to better detect specimen adulteration. Regardless of its color, labs can detect abnormal pH and creatinine levels in urine, and measure its specific gravity. So, even if you don't get busted for cheating per se, your persecutors might ask you to take the drug test again, on shorter notice and with closer observation.

Another myth is about claiming to be a "passive" user, like by incidentally inhaling ambient pot smoke at a rock concert. You can try using that excuse, but if you're a regular pot smoker, it likely won't fly. Your level will probably be above the cutoffs and far above that of the passive smoker, which, at only about 5 ng/ml or so, is well below the cutoffs. The same goes for passive absorption, like from maybe handling a dollar bill that was unknowingly rolled into a "straw" to snort coke. But, nice try.

It's true that poppy-seed ingestion can cause false positives for opiates a few hours later in urine tests. But labs claim that hair analysis can distinguish between opiate abuse and poppy-seed ingestion. Additionally, the Feds are familiar with urine-adulteration tricks. Consequently, the Feds upped the ng/ml detection level beyond that of "normal" poppy-seed ingestion, but still within the range of abuse. Normal ingestion is considered to be like two poppy-seed muffins in a day, tops.

So, if you're a heavy abuser of opiates, you can scratch the excuse that you wolfed down a dozen poppy-seed muffins on the morning of drug testing. But you could say that smoking an early-morning joint gave you the munchies, and that's why you ate so many muffins. If you think that's a great idea, perhaps it's time to check yourself into a drug-rehab clinic!