Pre-employment Drug Screening as a part of Pre-employment Background Checks

By | May 31, 2011

It is observed that there has been an increase in the number of substance abusers who are employed. As you know, illegal drugs affect the physical and mental health of an individual. Drug abusing employees do not come regularly to work and this affects their individual performance. This in turn has an effect on the organizational performance. Also, there is an increased risk of accidents in the company due to the drug abused employees. So the employers will be suffering with the health costs as well as the insurance costs. In order to avoid these problems, drug testing is conducted at workplaces. However, performing drug tests before hiring a candidate can be much beneficial.

Pre-employment background checks are conducted on job applicants to know their conduct. The educational qualifications, criminal background, and many other things are checked in these pre-employment background checks. Pre-employment drug screening is also performed as a part of pre-employment background checks to avoid hiring people who are abused or addicted to illegal drugs. This is done as a part to reduce the likely risks and problems associated with drug abusers at workplace.

Applicants are checked for the presence of different types of drugs. They are most commonly checked for marijuana, cocaine, amphetamines, barbiturates, and opiates. They can be checked at once with the help of multi-panel drug test kits. Many employers are using 5 panel, 10 panel, and 12 panel drug test kits these days to save the costs associated with drug testing. Urine drug test kits, saliva drug test kits, and hair drug test kits are used most commonly by the employers to conduct pre-employment drug tests.