Evaluation of the NexScreen and DrugCheck Waive RT Urine Drug Detection Cups

• Published in: Journal of analytical toxicology Vol. 37; no. 1; pp. 30 - 36
• Main Authors: Lin, Chia-Ni, Nelson, Gordon J., McMillin, Gwendolyn A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Oxford University Press 01-01-2013
• Subjects: Antidepressive Agents - urine; Barbiturates - urine; Benzodiazepines - urine; Chromatography, Liquid; Humans; Immunoassay - methods; Limit of Detection; Mass Spectrometry; Methadone - urine; Methamphetamine - urine; Sensitivity and Specificity; Specimen Handling; Street Drugs - urine; Substance Abuse Detection - instrumentation; Substance Abuse Detection - methods; Substance-Related Disorders - diagnosis; Substance-Related Disorders - urine; Urinalysis - instrumentation; Urinalysis - methods
• ISSN: 0146-4760; 1945-2403
• DOI: 10.1093/jat/bks087

Urine drug testing is an important tool that is commonly used to assess patient compliance with prescription regimens. Point-of-collection immunoassay devices allow for timely availability of laboratory test results to guide therapy during the same office visit. Two waived immunoassay-based urine drug screen cups were evaluated in this study. The NexScreen cup and the DrugCheck Waive RT cup claim to detect 10-12 drug classes of commonly used and/or abused drugs. This study included a sensitivity and precision challenge with 4-6 replicates at concentrations 0-150% of the manufacture's claimed cutoff, using drug-free urine spiked with purified reference standards. The stability of test results was evaluated by reading the results at intervals between five and 1,440 min. Specificity was evaluated by parallel comparison of pooled patients' specimens, representing 56 patients and 41 known drug compounds. When comparing results to validated liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry results, false positives were observed in the NexScreen cups for benzodiazepine, methamphetamine, methadone, opiates and tricyclic antidepressant tests, but there were no false negatives. The DrugCheck Waive RT cups showed false negative results for barbiturates and opiates, but no false positives. Overall, the NexScreen cup demonstrated better sensitivity than claimed, whereas the sensitivity of the DrugCheck Waive RT cup did not meet claims.