Welcome to ARUP Pain Management
Supporting Pain Management through Excellence in Drug Testing
To ensure safe and effective therapy, current practice guidelines recommend monitoring patients for adherence to prescribed pain medication through periodic drug tests. However, drug testing strategies and test methods are not well standardized, adding challenges to the selection of the right test and to the interpretation of test results. ARUP is here to help.
What We Do Best
Drug Screen
Panels
Quantitative Confirmation
Urine, Serum, and Plasma
Professional Consultation
Operational Consultation
Commonly Used Testing Strategy
Drug Screen Panels
Options include point-of-care cups, immunoassays, and a unique highresolution time-of-flight mass spectrometry screen. Reflex to confirmatory testing is available. Sensitivities vary significantly between screen options.
Quantitative Confirmation
When indicated, the result of a drug screen should be confirmed by mass spectrometry to verify the identity and concentration of specific drugs and their metabolites. Confirmation is indicated if the result of the screen is inconsistent with clinical expectation or pharmacy history. Confirmation of opiates/oxycodone and/or benzodiazepines is indicated (regardless of the screen result) if patient is prescribed those drugs. New drugs are continuously added to the menu.
Urine, Serum, and Plasma
All three specimen types are available for most drugs. Urine is the common choice for both the screen and the confirmation tests. However, serum or plasma are appropriate for patients on dialysis, to minimize risk of specimen adulteration, to correlate symptoms or dose with drug concentration, for suspected cases of malabsorption (e.g., gastric bypass), and for evaluating other aspects of individual patient’s pharmacokinetics.
Professional Consultation
Our medical directors can assist in the selection of tests and interpretation
of results. We also offer free CME, SAM, and CEU video lectures and other
educational resources. See list.
Operational Consultation
Contact us if you have questions on procedures, billing codes, and practices at pain@aruplab.com
Consult our FAQ page for common questions.
