Drug Screening vs Drug Testing What’s the Difference?

Drug Screening vs Drug Testing

Drug screening and drug testing sound similar but they’re actually different. Don’t let people on the interwebs tell you anything different, man—especially people conducting drug screening or a drug test. Sure they both involve pissing in a cup, but get these two terms confused and it could lead to failure.

What is a drug screen?

A drug screen is a cheap and fast way of determining the contents of  your piss. In contrast a drug test takes much more time and money to perform. Think of a drug screen as like the dude at the airport holding the metal detector. He’s only screening to see if you’ve got some metal on ya. Think of the drug test as the dude at the airport that’s going to force you to strip naked and possibly shove his finger in your ass.

Drug screening

Like we said a drug screen is cheap and fast. Drug screening allows labs to quickly review samples. They’re very sensitive but not very selective. That means a drug screen can result in a false positive. For example more than  60% of drug screens deliver a positive for amphetamines that later prove to be negative on a drug test. This means 6 out of 10 people screening positive for amphetamines have no amphetamines in their system. A negative drug screening is typically follow up with drug test to figure out exactly what’s in your system and how much.

Drug testing

A drug test takes a lot more time and costs a lot more money than a drug screen. When it comes to a drug test they’re generally done using Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS. ) to identify different substances within a test sample. You’ll find these machines not only used for drug testing people for weed, they’re also used to determine what’s inside weed itself. If you’ve ever bought weed in a package that lists its specific THC, CBD or CBG content you can thank a GC-MS machine for that detailed information. These machines are extremely precise pieces of equipment that can measure the molecular size, charge, and weight of the atoms in the drug metabolites—easily ruling out false positives—and differentiating poppy seeds from opiates, ibuprofen from THC metabolites, nasal spray from amphetamines, etc. Anyhow if a test is labeled “Drug Test” then you know a gas chromatography/mass spectroscopy (GC/MS) has to be performed.

Why urine drug screen?

If a urine drug screen is so inaccurate why do labs even do them? Money. Doesn’t it always come back to money? It would be way too costly for your future employer or law enforcement to run a piss test on every sample they collect. So screening allows them to quickly weed out the samples without weed. If the sample passes the drug screen then the drug test is done and you’re given a passing status. If the sample fails the screen, it moves on to the drug test or confirmation test to determine specific levels. Combining the two is what most major corporations do before they hire someone.

Green Gone Detox

Best way to pass a drug screening test

If you don’t have time to spare, your best bet is to use a THC detox product. We always recommend Green Gone Detox. It’s an all-natural permanent THC cleanse unlike THC detox drinks which are typically “masking” agents—meaning they don’t physically pull THC metabolites out of your system permanently. Instead they decrease the concentration of metabolites found in your urine for a brief period through dilution.

Sometimes the dilution method is enough to work. But if you’re a heavy user don’t count on it. A permanent THC detox is what you need. It’s really the only way to increase your body’s output and elimination of the THC metabolites that’ll cause you to fail.

If you’ve ever failed a drug test for Delta-8 THC, please tell us about your experience in the comments below.

Have a drug screening coming up? Let us know how it goes in the comments below…



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