Healthcare and Hospital Drug Testing | Health Street (2024)

There are numerous career routes across the healthcare sector, from residential care facility nurses and family physicians to radiology technologists and hospital patient care technicians. Between 2021 and 2031, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that the employment rate for healthcare occupations will grow by an impressive 13%, with no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

While healthcare professions are booming, it's important to remember that the sector is highly safety sensitive and patients will rely upon medical staff to provide quality care to remain healthy. Therefore, as a healthcare employer, it's your job to maintain quality standards across the workplace through compliance with industry standards and complex regulations, including healthcare drug testing requirements.

For all things relating to healthcare drug testing, Health Street offers a robust collection of services to help you ensure complete compliance with local, state and federal regulations and optimal safety among your healthcare employees.

Order online today or call (888) 378-2499.

Why is Drug Testing Important to a Healthcare Provider?

Drug testing for healthcare professionals is extremely important as it allows employers to effectively comply with complex regulations while also identifying concerns that could impact the quality of patient care.

To demonstrate the underlying importance of healthcare drug testing services, consider a surprising statistic revealed in a recent survey conducted by APN, an addiction treatment organization for healthcare professionals. The study found that 14% of physicians admitted to consuming alcohol or controlled substances while attending to patients in the workplace.

Failing to use healthcare drug testing to identify employees with underlying substance abuse issues could result in significant harm to patients as well as costly legal repercussions for both the employer and employee. Government, state medical board, or company regulations may also require specific positions to comply with pre-employment drug screening requirements as well as random or post-incidents testing when necessary.

With much of the healthcare sector belonging to private entities, requirements for healthcare and hospital drug screening for employment purposes typically come down to the decision of a healthcare employer's specific company. Because of this, it's important for healthcare employers to first address their workplace policy to determine which testing requirements and abilities they have.

How Can I Use Drug Testing for My Healthcare and Hospital Workplace?

Employers in the healthcare sector require the ability to monitor for and identify substance abuse concerns over the entire course of an individual's employment. To do so, healthcare employers should begin with the use of pre-employment screenings to identify any existing substance abuse in applicants prior to job placement. This requirement is typical in most healthcare settings and helps support safe operations as early as day one.

Depending on your workplace's specific testing policy, healthcare employers may then want to consider the use of random drug screenings. Including random drug screenings as part of your drug-free workplace policy helps encourage medical staff to remain on the right path while supporting the identification of underlying substance concerns employers may not be aware of.

In the event of a workplace incident, healthcare employers can also use post-accident or reasonable suspicion drug testing when allowed by workplace policy. The use of such healthcare and hospital drug testing helps reduce the overall chance of ongoing workplace patient or employee incidents, while also acting as a form of legal support in the event of a patient or employee lawsuit.

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