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bub88

First, let me say that I am not a heavy smoker. The last time that I smoked was about 10 days ago and before that, it had been at least a month and a half. I am, however, in tight quarters with a heavy smoker on a daily basis.

I have recently been asked to take on a part time job from June to August. With only one day of notice, I had to take a drug test. On the advice of a friend, I drank q carbo and lots of water. Today, one week later, I found out that the test was "invalid." No other information.
So, I now have to take another test tomorrow. And it will be observed. I passed a home test, but I am still nervous. The job isn't that important, but it is tied to my regular job and that is VERY important. Any help here??

 

monkeynipple

First... it took them a whole week to get back to you to tell you the test was invalid? A full 7 days? That's very surprising, do you mind if I ask what company operated the testing center that you went to?

As far as passing the re-test, if you passed the at-home you should be good. However it probably wouldn't hurt to follow the steps outlined in the dilution method sticky if you're nervous. Make sure the pee doesn't *look* too dilute or they may reject it on the spot. They'll be suspicious of you this time.

anxious

did you pass the home test on your first void of the day?

if so, you should pass with only drinking 20 oz of gatorade 1.5 hours before the test.

if not, you should practice the dilution method.

sounds like that q-carbo crap gave you a negative dilute.

and being in tight quarters with a heavy smoker should not cause a positive. there has been ample research on this issue.

Sec

Not so unusual at all. If he took the test late on Friday, with the holiday, the lab may not have even received the specimen until Wednesday. One or two days for testing and reporting to the employer, and what do you know? A week has gone by. Quite normal.

BTW, there are no "invalid" readings. Only dilute, adulterated, positive, negative or substituted (or any combination of the above).

Invalid would be if the temp were off or the color was abnormal or the specimen had a distinct bleach or otherwise abnormal odor.

If it was diluted, sounds like you need to re-test. Most don't require observation for a re-test due to diluted result unless it was a dilute positive or so diluted as to be found to be inconsistent with human urine.

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monkeynipple

I'm not trying to be nit-picky, but figuring out the precise number of days it can take for a lab to report results is actually quite important to me (hence my separate post on the topic). Therefore, let me point out that if he took the test a full week (7 days) before receiving his 'invalid' result, he would have taken the test on Wednesday 5/21. I'm not sure why you're assuming he didn't take the test until late Friday. You're right about the long weekend, but even still, it doesn't really make sense to me how it would take a full week.

Do you agree that once a test comes back 'invalid' (or dilute or whatever), it becomes a priority to get the test-taker back into the lab immediately for a re-test? There is a suspicion that the person is trying to cheat the test, hence the supervision on the re-test and the demand for them to come back in immediately. So once the test results were processed (probably by last Thursday 5/22 or Friday 5/23 at the LATEST), I would have expected him to be contacted without further delay.

But this timeframe is based on the assumption that yesterday (Wednesday), when he said "Today, one week later...", he really meant a full one week and was not just using that expression figuratively. Hence my original inquiry into how specific he was being.

I would also still like to know what company handled the testing, as I'm sure some have faster processing times than others.

 

bub88

Thank you for your replies. The compay that did the testing is Labcorp. I took the test today and I guess that I will just have to wait to see what happened.

Oh, I forgot to mention the other thing that stuck me as strange. It was an entire 7 days before I was told that the result was invalid. And it was my perspective employer that told me. Not the chain of custody. Is that strange?