Hello Everyone,
As some of you know, I’m a chronic pain patient. As such I’ve been taking opiods for 15 years now. Currently I’m taking extended release morphine and percocet for breakthrough pain.
In the last few months I’ve had to take two drug screen tests for work. Both detected that I had opioids in my system, but when asked by the drug screen doctor about them they only asked if I had a prescription for morphine. Neither asked about the oxycodone.
I’m just curious, does a drug screen see all opioids as morphine or does the test breakdown each drug and identify them separately?
Routine employment drug screens do not generally detect synthetic opioids like oxycodone or fentanyl. The basic opiate screen detects morphine and derivatives like hydromorphone and heroin. They only asked for documentation of a morphine prescription because that is all the test detected.
Tests for synthetic opioids are available, as you’re likely familiar with from your doctor for pain management patients, but they are more expensive. Most employment drug screens are to comply with “drug free workplace” requirements in order to be eligible for government contracts or similar rather than drug enforcement for its own sake, and as such cheap is more important than thorough.
A drug screen can be as simple as a crude test for one chemical to a very specific test that can not only identify a particular drug but also the maker based on identifying fillers and inert ingredients as well.
The “10 panel screen” is most likely a test for metabolic breakdowns of relatively common drugs. Yes, it might might “see” all opioids as a variation of morphine. A lot depends on the particular test and how it’s formulated. It may or may not pick up on some synthetics. Such synthetics are likely to show up at “opiate” or “morphine” or some variant on the drug report.
If you have a prescription of any sort of opioid it will likely show a positive of some sort on such a test, but not a lot of detail. In that respect, a positive is a GOOD thing because it shows the test is working, you’re taking your prescribed medication, and/or you did not substitute your pee with someone else’s.
When taking such a test you should be truthful and accurate in disclosing your prescription medications.
It is possible to subject your sample to much more detailed testing but it’s unlikely to be done because those tests are significantly more expensive.
It’s impossible to say much more unless the exact details of the test are known. Do you have further concerns or has your curiosity been satiated?