Advantages of Drug Testing at Workplace

Two main reasons for conducting drug testing at workplace are, one because of popularity with its benefits and other one is, in United States, strict guidelines were passed to provide a safe work environment for the employees. This could be the reasons why employers are conducting drug testing at workplace.

Most of the organizations have already implemented drug testing programs at their workplace. Business' owners are enjoying with its benefits like drug-free working environment, increased productivity, decreased absenteeism, decreased insurance claims, etc. Mainly two types of employment drug testing are conducted at workplace:

• Pre-employment drug testing: This type of testing is done on those applicants who are offered the job. Therefore, this helps the employer in preventing hiring drug-abused job applicants.

• Post-employment drug testing: This type of drug testing is done on the employees of the organization based on random check-up, periodic testing, suspicion, post-accident, etc. This helps the employer to ensure the presence or absence of drug abusers in the organization.

In this article, we will discuss about the advantages of conducting drug testing at workplace.

• Reduces absenteeism and tardiness: In general, drug abusers frequently fall sick or get ill and they will be lazy in doing work. That's the reason, you can notify the behavior of drug abuser – spending time on related activities, taking long lunch breaks, coming late to office and going early, arguing with other co-workers, frequently gets absent to the work, etc. This will effect the company's productivity.

By implementing drug testing programs in organization – helps the employer to find the drug abusers and take the necessary actions based on drug testing policies – oral warning or termination. This will discourage employees in taking drugs. Therefore, it reduces absenteeism and tardiness.

• Ensures employee safety: Safety at workplace is often the main reason to conduct drug testing. Because some jobs are very dangerous to perform – operating heavy machinery, driving, working with sharp objects, working over a hot stove, etc. So, make sure to do drug testing before such employees goes to work. This helps in protecting them as well as other employees of the organization.

• Avoiding the problem down the road: Pre-employment drug testing helps the employer to get the potential hires. Upfront paying for drug testing saves the employer money, time and efforts – instead of wasting time to re-hire or compensation to the injured drug abuser.

• Public relations: The reputation of the organization rely on its employees, performance and professionalism in operating the business. Some of the organizations advertise about the drug testing program in their organization to gain public trust and confidence.

Importance and Benefits of Drug Testing at Workplace

Some employers are testing their employees for drugs as they want to keep drug abusers away from the workplace. Many employers feel it is necessary to test the employees before hiring them. It is specially true in the industries which deals with heavy machinery such as forklift drivers, assembly workers and even drivers in order to prevent any accidents at the work place. Employers want to test the employees because drug misuse increases the chances of accidents at work and interferes with how much work is done.

Performing Drug Testing at the Work place:
Many organizations hire contract laboratories to conduct drug testing on their employees. Drug screening at the workplace needs a well written policy which should be informed to employees as well as managerial workers. This process also requires the consent of the employees.

Workplace drug testing can be done by various ways which includes random drug testing, reasonable suspicion drug testing, annual drug testing and after treatment for a previous bout with drug use. Employers conduct these drug tests in order to operate the business efficiently as drug abuse also shows great effect on the performance of the employees and also on the success of the organization.

Kinds of Drug Tests Available:
There are different types of drug testing kits available for performing the drug tests in the work place, urine drug tests, saliva drug tests and hair drug tests are the most commonly used tests used at the workplace. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages and hair drug tests gives the accurate results. Urine testing is best suited for a work place drug testing because it is easy to administer and the results can be read and photocopied in a matter of minutes.

Know Importance of Drug Testing

Drug addiction causes many health problems, it disrupts family relations and it also shows effect on the career of the individual who is abusing drugs. There are certain actions done by health agencies worldwide to decrease the rate of drug addiction, these measures are not effective and the number of people who are getting addicted to drugs are increasing instead of decreasing. At present there are lot of tests which are used to know whether a person is taking drugs and these tests are widely applied in the sports to test the athletes who use performance enhancing drugs.

Generally drug testing is a technical examination of urine, blood, hair and other fluid samples from the body's system and these tests traces weather a person is taking drugs or not. There are different types of drug tests which includes urine test, hair follicle test or saliva test, blood test and the skin test. Drug testing can be done at schools, work places and medical institutions. Some big organizations are testing their employees before hiring because they don't want to spoil the work environment. Previously these drug tests are done in the laboratories under supervision of experts. Now you can do these tests at your home with simple home kits. These are very helpful for the parents to test their children for drug abusing. Parents can receive the samples from the children without their awareness and perform drug testing.

Among the above said tests which are available for testing the drug abuse, the test which can give better results is the hair follicle test because the sample for this test is the hair which is attached on a person's scalp wherein the number of toxins and contaminants can be easily determined. But in the other tests which uses urine and saliva, they can be easily replaced and there is a great chance of getting false results.

Listing the Benefits of Home Drug Test Kits

Illicit drug abuse is common in youth and parents are concerned about their health. Drug addiction among youth results in morbidity and mortality during adolescence or during later stages of life. So it is necessary to conduct regular drug tests at home. Home drug test kits can be used by parents for checking drug addiction in their children.

• Home drug test kits are easy to use. Their design is made in such a way that they can be easily administered by parents.
• A drug testing kit used at home can avoid expensive laboratory tests.
• There are no privacy issues involved in using of home drug test kits. Drug testing can be conducted by parents safely and privately.
• Quick and accurate results are provided by home drug test kits. The kits are checked by FDA for approval to maintain reliability of results.
• Single or multiple drugs including cocaine, marijuana, alcohol, amphetamines, and others can be detected.
• Cost of these kits is very less when compared to laboratory testing. They are thus affordable to use at home. The cost of a drug test kit which can check for multiple drugs also ranges from $5 to $15.
• Drug addiction among children can be checked frequently at homes. This helps in maintaining health of children.
• Consumption of drugs in past few hours to few days can be detected by home drug test kits. Thus, requirement of sending the sample to laboratories can be eliminated.

Because of these benefits, home drug test kits are used at homes, schools and other organizations. These are also used by some job applicants who are to be facing a random drug test at interviews.