PHARMACIST STEVE

When the urine test LIES

When the urine test LIES

Many doctors are insisting that their chronic pain pts routinely have to take a urine test to determine if they are taking their prescribed medications – or not – or to discover if patients are taking other medications/substances legal or illegal.

“Failing a drug test” will normally mean that a patient is summarily dismissed from the practice.
Many of these office practices that have elected to use the inexpensive “pee in a cup” form of test.
Physicians are use to lab testing to be 100% accurate, except these “pee in a cup” tests have a reported 20% error rate, but often the practices that use these tests… have apparently not read the “fine print” about their accuracy.

Often some of the false positives – tests shows some drug/substance in the urine that they patient has no knowledge of every taking.

Unfortunately, there are many foods, OTC medications and prescription medications that will throw a “positive test” for a banned substance in the urine.

Something as innocuous as the prescription medication like Amoxicillin or Ampicillin could show up as a COCAINE in the urine.
Having taken Robitussin DM for a cold could show up as PCP or a opiate.

Here is a link to a rather extensive list of possible false positive urine test results;

http://www.keystosaferschools.com/drug-testing/drug-testing-false-positives-for-urine-testing

It may be appropriate for every patient, being subjective to urine tests, to carry a print out of the list on the above hyperlink. If you show a “false positive” at the physician’s office for a urine test… it could be possible to refute the result before it is added to your medical records and you are discharged/fired from the practice.

Filed under: General Problems