I was flipping through the channels this afternoon and came upon the movie Fingerprints. Since the lead actress (Leah Pipes) is very pretty, I stayed and watched for a bit. The movie was kinda dumb, I thought, but the girl is cute.
Anyway, in one scene, Melanie’s (Leah Pipes’) mother cuts a lock of the girl’s hair and claims that a “hair test” is the only way to be sure that she isn’t “on drugs.” What is a hair test? I’ve never heard of any consumer-available test for drugs that involves hair. I can’t even think how hair would be a good test for contemporary use of drugs. The girl in the movie has long hair, which suggests to me that the ends of her hair actually left their follicles some time ago (say four weeks). If some residue of drugs was present in the hair, it could only indicate her drug use four weeks ago. Her drug use from yesterday would go undetected.
Check here for a home hair test. With this test, you take the sample at home but still have to send it to their lab for analysis.
I am not an expert but I have read about these in the past. Hair tests are good because they can show drug over time, as the hair keeps growing and each certain length of hair shows a certain time period. If the girl in the show had only used drugs recently, the drug would only show close to the follicle. If it was ongoing drug use, it would show over more of the length.
I can’t remember at all what show it was where this was explained but it was one of those forensic shows detailing actual crimes. After watching the show, I did some internet research because I thought it was very interesting.
The show I watched was about someone who had some heavy metal poisoning over a period of time and they were able to figure out how long, and with what, by looking at the hair.
Also, hair follicle testing is more accurate than other methods because drugs will leave the system over time but will stay evident in the hair. And, if the hair in question is quite long, drug use over a long time can be determined.
Isn’t science cool?
Anyway, do a google search on hair follicle drug test and you’ll get all kinds of hits.
On a related note, there was a rumor that this was the real reason Britney Spears decided to “impulsively” shave her head. She supposedly was worried that her ex-husband was going to get a court order that she submit to a drug test as part of the custody battle they were engaged in. So she had all her hair shaved off so it was impossible to test her for long-term drug use.
That’s actually the whole point. Urine- and blood- based tests only detect drug use from the past couple days (with the exception of just one drug – marijuana). Hair testing actually gives a practical picture (and isn’t so biased against marijuana).
Incidentally, I don’t believe people do an “ice core” sampling to measure how drug use changed over time. It’s still a “yes or no” result, although time-based analysis could be done.
Well, based on these replies, it sounds like the scene in the movie was pure BS. In the movie, the family (two parents and two teen daughters) are sitting down to dinner. There is a tension in the room and the mom starts in on Melanie. As she is talking, the dad moves to stand behind Melanie and places his hands on her shoulders to hold her in the chair. Mom pulls a pair of scissors from where they were hidden under her placemat. Mom moves behind Melanie, who is now struggling and throwing a fit, and cuts a lock of hair. It was from around the middle of her head and was about half the length of her shoulder-length hair. If I am understanding correctly, these hair drug tests want as close to the scalp as possible, if not the follicle itself. This movie just showed a snip of hair. I didn’t stay with the movie long enough to see how the drug test came out.
Yes, everything I have read says that the area closest to the scalp will give the most current reading. As you get closer to the end of the hair, it shows a longer time span. Taking it from the middle doesn’t do a damn bit of good. I believe it was a 1/2" was 30 days time (or something similar to that).
I just remembered. I’ve seen that movie. In her particular case, it’s even more important to get as close to the scalp as possible since she had just come out of rehab. Depending on how long she was in there, it’s entirely possible that she hadn’t been doing drugs (which I don’t think she had been - can’t remember) but would still test positive from her time before rehab.
Some of these drug tests that are marketed to parents suggest that they sneak into their child’s room and collect hairs from their comb or brush. Those are generally good enough to get a result on drug use. This way, they can do the test without the child even knowing about the test until the parents confront them with the results.
P.S. A similar test is done for DNA verification of bloodlines when registering purebred horses these days – a hair sample is taken from the newborn foal, and mailed to a lab (Univ of CA-Davis, usually).
After reading a couple of responses, I feel I should chime in with a good comparison.
A hair sample is like a tree ring sample from a tree. With a tree, you trace out 5 rings and see huge growth, that must’ve been a great year of growth 5 years ago for some reason (fertilized, plenty of water, etc). With a hair test, they can test out from the hair root follicle and find markers along the way that point to drugs (instead of increased growth in trees.)
Your hair follicle’s constantly pumping out new hair to replace the old dead hair growing at the end. If you did a drug 2 weeks ago, it’ll still be detectable from a hair sample around 1/2" away from your scalp.
I’ve read they can take hair from pretty much anywhere to get the sample, i.e.- You can shave your head, but they might just pluck a pube from your armpit /pubic area/ longest hair available, etc.
I’ve also always seen the hair test is accurate to 90’ish days, as opposed to the 30 day period from urine samples (for marijuana anyways).
Some of the sites I visited specifically said not to take hair from a comb. I think the reasoning goes along the lines of you have no way of knowing if it’s a full length hair, or how long it has been there.
I don’t know about you guys but I have long hair and I think I replace my brush more often than I get around to cleaning it. I generally have a couple of months worth of hair on my brush and then I replace it (I can’t stand the feel of free floating hair, even my own, which is why I have cleaning issues).
So, if I’ve only been doing drugs for a few weeks and you happen to grab a hair that’s 2 months old, you’re not going to find a thing.
My dad’s company uses hair samples for their pre-hiring drug test. It makes sense (to me at least) as most of the guys they’re hiring are going to be driving heavy equipment and/or trucks.
My dad told me the story of a guy he was hiring who came to the interview with longish hair (in a pony-tail) and a full beard. A generally hairy guy (think Robin Williams). When he came into the Dr’s office for his test, he was bald and clean-shaven. In fact, he had no eyebrows either. And had plucked his eyelashes too. He also claimed to have shaved his arms, legs, underarms, back, chest, and pubic regions.
When my dad suggested that he let a little hair from somewhere grow out for the test, the guy claimed that he had just joined a religion that required that he have absolutely no hair on his body ever. My father told him that was great for him, but he wouldn’t be able to hire him then.
He sued my dad for religious discrimination (it was thrown out at the first hearing).
When my company was hiring, one fella came in for his physical with his head shaved. The nurse had him drop his trousers, and she plucked a couple of his pubic hairs. When the lab results came back, he had not passed the test. :smack:
Board policy prohibits me from posting links. But a few minutes on Google Images (with the search filter off) will let you confirm that this wouldn’t have worked for Ms Spears.
Ok, maybe I’m just a little thick because I just woke up, but - where would this be exactly? I honestly can’t think of any place below the neck that I can’t easily shave.
Now, the hair tester employee who would have to pluck an inner cheek hair from one of those shave everything-ers gets my vote for appearing on Dirty Jobs!
I hate to disillusion you but it’s remarkably easy to shave there. It might require some initial trimming for hairy guys but it’s very easy. Flexibility is the biggest issue there.
Noxzema actually make small bikini area shavers which are perfect for shaving the ass crack.
Believe me, it’s easier to shave there than it is to shave around the labia.
Yeah but even if you shave everywhere, couldn’t they still just pluck an eyebrow hair? What about eyelashes (are they even the same thing?)? Seems like you’ll end up looking like Powder before you’re good to go.
