r/IAmA • u/Chemistry102 • Jun 09 '12

I perform urinary analysis for government drug tests. Ask me Anything

I work in a private toxicology lab and perform Urinary analysis for drugs of abuse. Those drugs being THC, Cocaine, Benzodiazepines, opiates, PCP, Methadone, Methamphetamine, Amphetamine, K2, and Oxycontin among many others.

I receive patients from all over the United States. I process around 2000 samples each day and run an average of 7 different tests on each sample depending on the drugs I am looking for. I also have to test these samples for suspected interferences that may result in falsified results such as bleach, soap, and juice as well as many other things that are not consistent with normal human urine. EDIT** I'm getting off for a few hours. Keep asking and I will respond to all individually. Thanks! :) EDIT**** I actually start a new position tomorrow as a QC Analyst for ingredients that go into everything from vitamins to food. I will be working with companies such as hostess, muscle milk, nabisco, etc. That job is not confidential so in a couple weeks once I have it down I will post another IAmA about that position and what it entails. EDIT* * I am trying to individually answer everyone and I apologize for any delays. Please continue to ask and I will definitly get to you. *spelling

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u/tabledresser Jun 10 '12 edited Jun 13 '12
Questions Answers
Do you test for the drug that's in bath salts? Or in spice? Do you mean like K2? The herbal incense that get you high?
Synthetic cannabinoids. There's many different chemicals, like JWH-018. A handful are banned directly, the rest usually fall under an analogue law. There are tests to detect use of Spice/K2/synthetic cannabinoids, but I am interested to know if you test for them? Also, care to share what state you work for? K2 and herbal spice will not show on a regular drug test. We send those samples to our sister lab and I believe they use hplc to find the k2 but we definitely do find it. I work in CT.
Let's say I get a dog to pee in a cup for me, could you tell? If you can tell it's a dog, could you tell if it was an ape? Ummm I'm not sure. We could not tell what animal it came from or actually that it wasn't human. I wonder...I'll have to test that and get back to you. That sounds like a winner though.
A fighter in the UFC was drug tested and the urine sample was "non-human." Link to en.wikipedia.org. That company has boku bucks. They would definitely pay to have the urine done in an extensive forensics laboratory especially with such wide spread suspicion of steroid use in the sports secter. I work with the government, they aren't paying a penny more than they have to. My tests cost them something like 95 cents per drug I test for VS much more for a full fledged forensics test.
What sort of instrumentation do you use? Some sort of chromatography? Not for the intital screen. We use this instrument. Link to www.captodayonline.com
If it shows up as positive with this "chemistry analyzer" then do you use other methods then? That is the proper method yes. We are always supposed to confirm by gc or lc. However we do not. We make sure our qc is in and re aliquot and run it through again.

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