If you’ve been told of an upcoming drug test, it might be a good idea to see what they’ll find for yourself beforehand. Purchasing a hair drug test to use at home is a great way of doing this, especially if you’re unsure whether you have anything to worry about. If you test yourself and the results come back negative, you’re most likely off the hook.
This means understanding how to read hair follicle test results levels. Without the know-how required to make the most of the test you’re taking, you’ll only be wasting your time. Keep reading to discover important information regarding the test and how to decipher your results.
Hair Follicle Test Basics
Firstly it’s a good idea to understand the basics regarding how the test works. When you take drugs, their influence on your body is further reaching than you might expect. To have any effect at all, the active chemicals in your preferred substance have to reach your brain.
It’s a long and winding path to the point where they permeate the blood-brain barrier and begin their influence. This means the chemicals flood your system as a whole, rather than taking a direct route to where they’ll begin to take effect. These drug metabolites end up in all sorts of places, transported throughout your entire body by your circulatory system.
The drugs themselves are quickly filtered from the blood by the kidneys, which makes blood tests a less-than-ideal choice for scrutinizing someone’s recent history. Hair drug tests, on the other hand, screen hair follicles because drug metabolites are detectable within them for at least ninety days after exposure. This makes them much more reliable and gives examiners and employers an in-depth view of someone’s past.
How to Read Hair Follicle Test Results Levels
Hair follicle drug test accuracy is impressive, to say the least. Due to the nature of how our hair traps drug metabolites as it grows, hair follicles act as the perfect diary regarding previous drug use.
Imagine if you wrote down your drug usage, when you used them, and how frequently. The results of the test would look similar to your records.
The key components of the drug test results have to be understood to glean any information from them. They’re usually written out as a template and the information is then filled in once the test has been conducted and the results are correlated. The names of the drugs will each have a heading, and the concentration of the corresponding drug metabolites will be listed underneath.
There are a few considerations to take into account when going through these results, as they’re not typically as cut and dry as they first appear. Failure to consider these variables may lead to inaccuracies and is one of the most common problems with hair follicle drug testing.
Drug Metabolite Concentration
The concentration of drug metabolites is one of the most important factors for accurately interpreting the results of the test. Results don’t simply state whether or not a certain substance was found; they typically outline its presence in the form of a degree of concentration. This is most commonly represented in the form of nanograms per milligram (ng/mg).
A little discretion is required on the part of the person interpreting these results, as smaller concentrations aren’t conclusive evidence of drug taking. Certain foods are capable of producing a similar effect to that of some drugs hair follicle tests screen for. For example, diets rich in poppy seeds are known to sometimes cause a false positive test result for opiates.
Detection Windows
While hair follicle drug tests are among the most effective for scrutinizing past drug use, they’re not infallible. Hair older than ninety days isn’t considered reliable, as that’s the hair follicle drug test cutoff in terms of how old a viable test sample can be. It also takes a few days for drugs to be detectable within hair after use.
It’s generally agreed upon that it takes somewhere between seven and eleven days until drug metabolites will show up in hair. Any sooner than that and there won’t be sufficient metabolite concentration for the test to reliably identify. Other types of tests are much more effective for screening for recent use, as hair follicle tests are all but useless in this regard.
Drug Use Patterns
The presence of drug metabolites within the body rises and falls along with the use of each drug. This means hair follicles contain sufficient information to detail patterns of use and help to determine if someone is an addict or not. Sporadic use will show metabolites punctuated by periods of abstinence, while consistent regular use will show no such gaps.
While this is interesting information to have, it’s also not completely foolproof. We each have different metabolisms, and our bodies often grow hair at substantially different rates. The faster the hair growth, the more sporadic the drug use will appear.
Consulting Experts
The information provided by hair follicle test results is undoubtedly extensive, but it takes someone with an in-depth knowledge of the process to make proper use of it. If you’re unsure how to read your results or would like a second opinion, it’s worth consulting an expert.
Tests conducted at home are useful for giving a general idea of what drug metabolites exist in your hair, if any, but they’re usually somewhat less accurate than those done professionally. It’s always worth taking a certain degree of error into account, especially before you decide to rely upon your results.
Mike’s Macujo Method Detoxing Solutions
It’s always a good idea to test yourself before you’re tested by someone else, just to be on the safe side. We’ve helped thousands of people beat their test over the years thanks to Mike’s Macujo Method, and we sell a test kit, too. Head over to our product page to check it out!
If you’re still wondering how to read hair follicle test results levels or have any other questions regarding drug metabolites in hair, don’t hesitate to reach out to us! We’re always on hand and make a special effort to reply to everyone as soon as possible.
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