Psychological Symptoms of Drug Abuse

Breathalyser

Medical professionals have developed a host of terms in an effort to describe substance abuse. Technology has greatly advanced the understanding of the physical impacts, but theories like the biopsychosocial model reflect the fact that substance abuse involves more than biological factors. There are also cultural, social, and psychological factors involved in the use of drugs and in the display of their effects.1 On the use side, succumbing to peer pressure is a typical social factor and poor mental health could be a psychological factor. On the flip side, the symptoms of substance are also evident as biological, social, and psychological. Most are familiar with the physical and behavioural symptoms, but what are the psychological symptoms indicating substance abuse?

Beware of Assumptions

One thing is for certain – substance abuse is complex and so are its symptoms. Though there are common symptoms for each type of drug, no two people experience identical ones. That can make it difficult for people in the workplace to identify if someone is using drugs unless valid drug testing is done. It is easy to make the wrong assumptions, which is why managers must be thoroughly trained in properly responding to their suspicions. The psychological symptoms of substance abuse are some of the most difficult to identify as being related to substance abuse.

It is not too difficult to spot someone who has been drinking when the person begins slurring words and losing coordination. The physical symptoms are quite obvious. People using illicit drugs like cocaine frequently experience persistent runny noses and experience excessive sweating and chills. Behavioural symptoms are often easy to spot too. A drug user who previously enjoyed being around others will begin to avoid co-workers or work performance noticeably declines. However, someone who is anxious may be on cocaine, but is more likely to be under stress or have personal problems related to family or finances.

Only Drug Testing Tells the Truth

It is now recognised that there are psychological symptoms associated with substance abuse. For example, crystal methamphetamine or ice creates feelings of euphoria or excitement. Is the overly-enthusiastic employee using ice? Ice use can also lead to anxiety, depression, and tension.2 Is the anxious employee on drugs? Obviously the situations and the answers are not simple. Only workplace drug testing can definitively determine if someone is using drugs or alcohol. It is impossible to look at one symptom or one type of symptom and know if someone is violating the zero tolerance policy.

However, it is important to understand that substance abuse does have psychological symptoms and not just behavioural and physical ones. The psychological symptoms include:

Unexplained changes in attitude (key word is “unexplained” Noticeable change in personality (personality does not normally change without some kind of trigger) Outbursts of anger at the slightest or no provocation (over-reacting) Laughing at nothing (like the person is laughing at a private joke) Sudden mood changes Appearing mentally disoriented (“spaced out”) Loss of motivation (in a person who was previously performed well) Difficulty focusing or paying attention Acting paranoid or extremely anxious for no reason Becoming fearful for no reason Becoming withdrawn

Most of the time drug users will exhibit a combination of psychological, behavioural and physical symptoms, and that is how managers are led to test for just cause. The most important step an employer can take to identify substance abuse in the workplace is by doing consistent on-site drug testing. There is simply no substitute for facts.

CMM Technology is one of the oldest suppliers of AOD products that are stringently tested to ensure they produce the correct results. Products include technology for alcohol testing, saliva drug test, and urine drug test. 

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/psychological-symptoms-of-drug-abuse/

Mistakes in D&A Testing DO Count

Drug Testing

Everything in life has risks and rewards, and workforce testing for drugs and alcohol is no different. The rewards of a substance free workplace include a lowered risk of accidents and injuries, higher productivity, and reduced health costs. The maximum rewards are only derived when the AOD program is managed correctly and legally. The risks, on the other hand, flow from failures to act. For example, management fails to develop a healthy workplace culture or the on site drug testing schedule is not followed. What are the other common drug testing mistakes that can quickly get employers in trouble?

Staying Off Shaky Ground

The first two common mistakes cover a broad area. First, the failure to develop a culture that discourages substance use and encourages ethical behaviour can raise the risk employees will use drugs and alcohol. There should be a positive culture that engages everyone in the organisation in the effort to keep drugs and alcohol out of the workplace. A poor workplace culture contributes to worker health problems like alcoholism and drug addiction.1 Developing a substance free culture has to start in the executive suite, flow down through the organisation and be regularly reinforced through messaging, employee resource groups, and worker training and development.

The second broad mistake is failing to have a written drug and alcohol testing policy. A corollary is failing to have a policy that meets federal and state or territory laws. Without a policy, employers stand on shaky legal ground in terms of enforcing a substance free workplace. In addition, the policy provides the consistency in the message delivered to employees and the responses should employees test positive to drugs.

List of Common Failures

Other common mistakes include the following:

Failing to follow the policy and procedures that were put in place Using a company that is not AS4308 & AS4760 accredited for drug and alcohol testing Failing to train managers in proper responses after developing suspicion an employee is using drugs Failing to train employees on the policy whilst expecting compliance Taking action on the first non-negative onsite drug testing results without obtaining confirmatory testing at an accredited laboratory Not maintaining proper documentation that indicates the chain of custody for the sample Breaching drug and alcohol testing confidentiality Treating certain employees inconsistently, i.e. never test, test more frequently, ignore positive results, etc. Small mistakes can lead to major employer problems. For example, The Australian Standard requires that certain protocols be followed concerning sample handling when there is a non-negative test result. If the employer fails to follow the Australian Standard, an employee is likely to claim the employer cannot “prove” anything (and is right).

Tell Me Again...

The drug and alcohol program needs the same attention to detail as other critical programs like compensation or job training. Workers should be thoroughly trained on the AOD policies and procedures. It is also just as important to share information that helps employees cope with workplace conditions and situations without turning to drugs or alcohol. The training has to be ongoing too. One more common mistake employers make is believing that telling a worker once, at the time of hiring, that drugs and alcohol are not allowed is all the training needed.2

Mistakes in D&A programs do count. To help employers avoid critical mistakes, CMM Technology supplies them with quality saliva drug test, urine drug test, and alcohol test supplies. In addition, CMM Technology has the appropriate documentation that simplifies the recording process whilst assisting employers with meeting legal requirements.

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/mistakes-in-da-testing-do-count/

Continuous Quality Improvement and AOD Programs

oral fluid drug test

Continuous Improvement or Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) is a strategic approach to managing change by recognising incremental and measured improvements. It is a method of self-analysis in which validated assessments are completed, and the results are used to make the necessary incremental changes that work towards desirable outcomes.1 Applying this concept to the Alcohol and Other Drug (AOD) program means driving the organisation to a substance free workplace by continually improving AOD program policies and procedures, while strengthening an organisational culture that promotes a substance free workplace.

Informing Decisions

In CGI, each improvement implemented drives the process, system, or program to a better condition or state. The assessment process ensures that changes, cultural and otherwise, are sustained over time and that the effort to reach goals continues to improve over the long term. Each assessment becomes a method for informing decisions as to the next steps that should be taken. The Continuous Improvement process applied to the AOD program can ensure:2

AOD policy and procedures reflect industry and legal standards

Improve the validity of assessments

Enhance relevance of the AOD testing procedures

Increase transparency of the drug and alcohol program

Ensure there is regular feedback to employees after testing

Support quality assurance

Improve management of the AOD program

Guide worker training on the AOD program

Guide management training on AOD program

There are different ways to assess the AOD program. Benchmarking against industry leaders is one valuable assessment tool. However, benchmarking is mostly used by larger companies because it requires considerable resources that include commitments of personnel, software, data collection and interpretation, and so on. Even if resources are not available for elaborate benchmarking, small to medium size companies can still apply the principle of CQI to their AOD program.

Asking Questions Over and Over Again

It is not uncommon for companies to put onsite drug testing AOD testing in place and deal with results one-by-one without looking at the big picture. An employee tests positive for heroin and is temporarily suspended until completing rehab. Three weeks later, an employee in the same department tests positive for cocaine. The same type of event keeps occurring. Though there is follow-up with each person, the real question is: Is there a pattern of substance use in the department? If so, why? Once the “why” is uncovered, the next question is: What should we do about it? Once that question is answered, a change is implemented. The change may impact work processes in the department, frequency of drug and alcohol testing, definition of safety sensitive positions, revision of the Employee Assistance Plan, or any of a number of other things.

CQI is a transformation process, meaning it is ongoing. One of the important steps that should be taken is ensuring that drug & alcohol testing supplies are top quality and that AOD screenings are completed by an experienced qualified company. These are important steps for ensuring the results are accurate.

However, CGI involves assessing every step of the AOD program on a continual basis. It has employers asking the question, “How is the AOD program going, and can it be better?”

Program assessments can lead to changes step-by-step, including tweaking a policy, revising a random testing schedule, or enhancing program management or employee training. The important point to note is that the tweaking, revising, and enhancing will occur over and over again as the assessment indicates is necessary.

CMM Technology helps employers everyday in their efforts to maintain a substance free workplace by providing stringently tested AOD products and high quality expert services like equipment calibration. Producing accurate AOD testing results is a critical step in the CQC process.

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/continuous-quality-improvement-and-aod-programs/

Benchmarking D&A Programs to Increase Acceptance

Saliva Drug Test

Some things never change because they are based in solid business principles and practices. Benchmarking is one of them. It is a process designed to give business leaders a method for assessing organisational results against similar companies in the industry and has specific goals. Benchmarking increases accountability, increases commitment at all levels, and promotes a proactive rather than a reactive approach to whatever is benchmarked. Drug and alcohol programs and health and wellness programs are two areas that can benefit from benchmarking. Linking the two programs together and applying benchmarking increases effectiveness, results, and acceptance across the organisation.

Support for health, wellness, and safety programs has to begin at the top of the organisation and flow downward. An important element of occupational health and safety is maintaining a drug and alcohol free workplace. Benchmarking can play a critical role in making the business case for the programs, but it also provides information that enables the programs to be placed in context. This increases acceptance because it gives staff members something to compare against. It is the difference between saying, “The policy is no drugs and alcohol allowed,” versus “The policy is no drugs and alcohol, and self-analysis indicates our processes and procedures are effective (or need improvement).”

Beyond Statistics

Though it is important to have a drug and alcohol policy, it is also important to make sure that people understand that occupational health and safety and drug and alcohol testing are not simply programs to be managed. They are integral to business success as concepts that have the most impact on performance. As such, they are considered management systems involving much more than simple statistics like number of positive drug testing or number of accidents involving alcohol. Systems also involve policies and procedures, risk assessments, training, resources commitments, job design, and so on. 

Benchmarking does not just compare statistics between the organisation and world class industry leaders, though it is commonly viewed that way.

When benchmarking is used properly and applied to occupational health and safety and drug and alcohol programs, it will produce the type of information that strengthens them. That information includes better understanding of the current structures and systems; identification of system strengths and weaknesses; identification of barriers to success; goal setting; comparison of processes and systems against industry leaders; and acknowledgement of best practices.1 For example, the evaluation process may uncover a workplace layout that needs revision to lessen stress and thus reduce the probability of drug use. Or it might indicate the random drug and alcohol testing program is not effectively linked to the occupational health and safety program and so acceptance of testing is low. There might be issues raised about the workplace culture, pre-employment screening process, work practices, or follow-up procedures when an employee test positive for one or more substances.

The Big Picture

Too often, businesses design and implement programs but fail to evaluate their effectiveness over time, and this is particularly true for occupational health and safety programs and drug and alcohol policies and procedures. Effectiveness in this case refers to the much more than simple test counts and comparison of results to industry leaders. Programs are evaluated as whether employees voluntarily adopt healthy lifestyles, worker attitudes toward the drug free policy and testing program, minimisation of workplace risks, and so on.2 Drug and alcohol programs are a component of the larger OHS program and together they should form a top down management system.

It is impossible to cover the benchmarking process in a single article, but an excellent resource is the Worksafe Australia manual titled Benchmarking Occupational Health and Safety. The main point to keep in mind is that benchmarking involves much more than simply comparing statistics. It is a process that focuses on evaluating and strengthening management systems. When applied to drug and alcohol policies and procedures, the process links them to the bigger health and wellness processes. The end result will be stronger program in terms of effectiveness and enhanced worker understanding of its broader role.

One of the many areas that can be benchmarked includes accuracy of drug and alcohol test results. CMM Technology supplies businesses with NATA accredited equipment and is the only company in Australia that is NATA accredited for various types of breathalysers.

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/benchmarking-da-programs-to-increase-acceptance/

This Is No Technical Article

Saliva Drug Test

Medix integrated pro-split cup 6+6 urine drug test with built in adulterant test, Rapid STAT saliva drug test, and Lifeloc FC10 personal breathalyser devices are just a few of the types of drug test equipment and alcohol tests that CMM Technology has available for businesses which wish to protect themselves with high quality employee drug testing. Know that you cannot protect with drug testing, but that you can protect with decisions based upon your screening results that you get in.

This article, however, will not be technical in nature. Once again, CMM Technology would like to discuss the whole reason for even using drug test equipment: the humans who work for us.

People are in and of themselves fragile and incomplete. When we are complete, then we are ready to either die or move on to new levels of growth. Whatever the case, though, there is not a perspective on humans which seems to interact with the technological base of drug testing. Thought processes seem to either see science and numbers or people and human nature, but never really both. We would like to emphasize the strength in people, as well.

We would like to talk about how much people need employee drug testing, because it helps them feel safe when they are at work, as well as actually making them safe. We want to mention, in addition to this, how proud we are of our current business clients, for their growth, and their tenacity, and their will to become better companies.

That is something toward which to strive. Yes, we are NATA accredited for our breathalyser recalibration services, but we want to make your business our business. We have no shame in being at the lowest levels of company development, because, whatever the case, we are still a part of your development. That is so important.

CMM Technology takes pride in our products, and we take pride in our sister company, Mediscreen. However, most of all, we take pride in you, the businesses we serve and we produce the equipment to evaluate and data collect. If you want employee drug testing, place an order with us. 

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/this-is-no-technical-article/

The Twelve Step Program and How It Changes Over Time

Urine Drug Test

When a drug addict or alcoholic seeks help through a twelve step program, they are looking for a tiny amount of relief from their pain. Over time, they receive much more than this tiny amount of relief. However, they cannot have huge expectations of the program at one time, because it is designed to be used one day at a time, little by little, until the addict has peace and stability.

Unfortunately, many people drop out of their twelve step programs before they are completed and before they have reached the peace they desire and deserve so much. In fact, for experienced people who have been in their programs for many years and have refined their peace over this long period of time, the coming and going of newcomers is quite common. They know that not everyone stays, and that those who do may not remain for the period of time which they have.

Let’s talk about the experienced program followers, then. They will say that if you work the program and really do your best, over time you will accomplish a great deal, but that you must stick with it over time. Some of them even say that the program changes over time, but that part is not quite true.

You change as a person, and therefore receive different benefits from the twelve step program over time. You change and therefore the program “seems” to change, because you are getting more and more benefit out of it.

At CMM Technology, which is NATA accredited for breathalyser calibrations, we feel that there are many times when a company, during its growth and change, will need employee drug testing. Just because you have had no change in employment and no positive test results in the past five years does not make it any less of a company liability if someone is injured on the jobsite due to intoxication in some manner. We therefore provide breathalyser recalibration services, as well as drug test kits and saliva drug test.

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/the-twelve-step-program-and-how-it-changes-over-time/

The Sounds of Silence

We have all heard the notorious song by Simon and Garfunkel. It is something of a legend, actually. However, for anyone who has ever been given the silent treatment, it has a whole different connotation. It is jarring to the ears. It seems unnatural. You wonder what is wrong.

When substance abuse infuses a workplace, it may not get louder and more party-like. It may get quieter and lazier. What can you do when your employees are all sitting around apathetically and very casually doing their work? What do you do when everyone seems to be permanently depressed?

Well, first of all, you make sure there wasn’t a death in someone’s family. Now that you have that out of the way, start looking for practical solutions. There may be some sort of substance abuse. Employees may all be having a hard week at the same time, and someone started the trend. Maybe the trend continued and people stopped caring about their livelihoods. Whatever the case, you will need to do something about it, but you can’t without information.

Our Lifeloc FC10 breathalyser device and our Rapid STAT saliva drug test are especially popular, but we have products from all over the spectrum of drug test equipment, and we are here to help you get what you need when you need it. If you have a regular drug testing schedule, then you may find it helpful to have a standing order, but it is often necessary to just order when supplies begin running low. Drug test equipment should always be stored a little in excess, just in case an emergency pops up where you will need to screen a particular worker. On-site drug testing especially has need for high quality drug test equipment, and CMM Technology is most happy to oblige.

The sounds of silence do not have to hold sway in your building. Your jobsite can have happy, talkative voices again. The difference is in the stability of your employees. Make sure that it’s strong.

This article has been taken from: http://www.cmm.com.au/articles/the-sounds-of-silence/