WorkMED Focus

January, 1998, Vol. 5, No. 1, Pg. 1

Cutoff Levels for Opiates Raised

"The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) recently
revised the Mandatory Guidelines for the Federal Workplace Drug
Testing Programs, raising the cutoff level for opiate metabolites
effective May, 1998, which will mean a reduced number of false
positives.

Specifically, DHHS raised the initial testing cutoff level for opiate
metabolites and the confirmatory testing cutoff levels for morphine
and codeine from 300 ng/mL to 2,000 ng/mL and established a new
requirement to test for 6-acetylmorphine (6-AM) which is a metabolite
that comes only from heroine, using a 10 ng/mL confirmatory level
for specimens that have tested positive on the initial test only after
a laboratory confirms that morphine concentrations exceed 2,000 ng/mL
rather than testing for 6-AM on each specimen that was positive on
the initial test as had been proposed.  Therefore, a positive without
morphine present or with morphine less than 2,000 ng/mL will not
automatically require a test for 6-AM.

DHHS indicated that public comments submitted were favorable
to the proposed changes because there were too many false positives
reported with the lower cutoff levels.  Several people indicated that
more true drug abusers will be identified with the higher cutoff level
and labs will save money because they will not have to confirm the
positives."