Drug Testing the Hair

If you’re going to be facing a drug test, the hair drug test is probably not such a bad option. Although the tests are harder to fool than the urine sample testing can be, it is still possible to strip traces of anything untoward from your hair if you have been given a heads up that the test is likely to occur, and there is also the issues of false positives in hair testing (see here).

Drug testing is normally done because your workplace, sporting body or school has a blanket ban on certain substances. Even if those substances are perfectly legal, they may still get you into a lot of trouble if they go against a policy you know about.

What Drugs Are Hair Tests Looking For?

The short answer is: everything. Absolutely everything you have consumed or been exposed to leaves traces in your hair. However, no one actually wants to run all those tests, so as a general rule a hair test is run for a specific type of elements. A doctor might order a hair analysis to be undertaken to check a patient for allergies. A workplace might be checking if their employees are using methamphetamines, a school might be checking for cannabis exposure, and a sporting body might be checking for steroids

Each institution has rules and regulations around which substances they consider ok for those under their umbrella to use, and which ones are absolutely not allowed.

Marijuana Is Legal So Testing Doesn’t Happen

Unfortunately, even if you are in a state that has legalized marijuana that doesn’t mean that your employment contract has changed.https://www.inc.com/magazine/201904/bob-diddlebock-emily-canal/marijuana-legal-pot-workplace-drug-testing-medical-policy.html If you are working in a place that has a not drugs policy, you will need to confirm if this has been updated since the legalization of marijuana in your state. If the company has a federal contract, they are legally not able to allow their employees to use cannabis recreationally. As far as federal law is concerned, at this stage, Marijuana is still illegal.

Well. What Do I Do Now?!

So, you’ve just found out that you were actually smoking pot illegally – or at least in breach of your employment contract. If your company has a no drugs policy, chances are good that they also have a drug testing policy in place to enforce this. So, now you need to try and remove all trace of THC from your hair. You are going to need to invest in a good THC detox shampoo – and use it properly.

Strip Your Hair

A detoxifying shampoo is designed to strip everything from your hair, including oils, drugs, smoke residue and any other nasty’s that you may have been exposed to. However, there are different version of detox shampoos, and each has a different base. Although the two most common bases are propylene glycol and ammonia. If you read the reviews and forums you will be able to get some excellent recommendations on how best to use the shampoos. However, there are a surprising number of ‘fake’ shampoos that will not work as they do not contain a high enough concentration of the active ingredient, so be sure to check that you are getting the right product.

Hair Testing Process

Although the movies show a few strands of hair being pulled from a victim’s scalp that then get raced off to be tested in a lab, this isn’t quite how it works in real life.

Generally, 50 – 100 strands of hair will need to be used, but these will be cut rather than pulled out. However the person taking the sample will generally try to take samples from around the scalp, and most decent testers will also try to ensure that the samples are taken in such a way as they will not be overly visible (so no removal of the middle of your fringe).

They do need to be cut quite close to the scalp in order to detect recent use. As the drug or other substance enters the hair shaft from the oil gland, as the hair grows that section of the hair holds on to the metabolites, so a lab technician is able to see not only what you have consumed, but give an accurate time indication for when you consumed the substance.