Cocaine Qualitative:
Why Cocaine Qualitative Test?
CLINICAL INFORMATION
Drugs are a common term that refers to using any illegal drug. Drugs are chemicals or plant products that affect the mind and body. People who use these substances ingest, inhale, smoke, or inject into their bodies generally are taken intentional (drug misuse) for mind-altering characteristics, weight loss and/or enhancing athletic performance (use of anabolic steroids), or accidentally such as in case of drug overdose eg. Usage of alcohol, tobacco, over the counter medications and/or misuse of prescription drugs. In the long run, it becomes a craving habit also called addiction (a substance use disorder is a chronic disease in which repeated drug use leads to changes in the mind). Immunoassay (competitive binding) tests use antibodies to detect the presence of drugs and hence these tests can be processed rapidly (within detection window period – within a specific time-frame and if not it can be metabolized and can get eliminated from the body), are inexpensive, and are preferred for screening initial tests. This test is usually ordered to screed drugs such as cocaine metabolites (benzoylecgonine, ecgonine methyl esters), amphetamines, phencyclidine, marijuana, and opiate metabolites. Cocaine test helps to screen in many contexts including legal or forensic testing, medical testing, treatment adherence, monitoring for prescription drug misuse, athletic testing, military testing, drug testing minors, drug testing during pregnancy, etc. Sometimes in forensic medicine (police investigation, court cases, etc) sample specimen of urine is adulterated (tampering of a urine specimen with intention of altering the true test result values) is studied in urine adulteration in case of altering drug test (to produce false negative) results either by interfering with the screening tests and/or destroying the drug metabolites present in the urine sample. After the screening test, additional confirmatory tests are needed for supporting evidence which includes testing for confirmation, drug tests to evaluate in-toxicity, risk of false-positive results, risk of false-negative results, etc. this test is indicated in conditions such as job oriented tests, claim insurance, arrest made in drug testing as a part of parole, pulled over suspect of driving under the influence of drugs, in healthcare (drug abuse, emergency room symptoms, as a part of drug treatment, etc). Additional samples other than blood and urine specimens include saliva, hair, breath sweat, body fluids, etc. Other tests include liquid chromatography drug tests, mass spectroscopy, ELISA, etc. Cocaine Qualitative test is a specific highly refined test (HIGH SPECIFICITY) that is performed for qualitative analysis (purity- to confirm its presence) minimizing the errors of false-positive results.
General Instructions:
Sample Requirement: Specimen – Urine sample. Test Preparation: None.
NOTE - Sample for specimen collections may vary based on the patient’s condition/cases according to the patient’s presenting complaints/signs or symptoms:
SPECIMEN REQUIREMENT (Special or Rare Cases) - As instructed and guided by Physician / Clinician / Pathologist / as per Laboratory’s requirements, according to procedures and protocols.
Sample Requirement: Urine
Test Preparation: None
This Multi-Specialty Clinical Referral Laboratory RT DIAGNOSTICS provides precise and accurate tests with an extensive range of testing services to the medical centers to help in the diagnosis and identification of pathology in the test specimens for infectious diseases and also to evaluate the function of organ systems of the patient. It prevents further complications and helps to stabilize and restore health to near normalcy at the earliest without delay.
