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Click here for local treatment centers in Washington State This section provides assistance in recognizing the signs and symptoms of drug use as well as ideas on what to do and where to go for help. The following three documents describe symptoms of drug use: Washington State Substance Abuse Coalition: "Signs of Drug Abuse" Elks Drug Awareness Program: "How Can I Tell If My Child Is Using Drugs?" Resource Center on Substance Abuse Prevention and Disability: "Symptoms Checklist" When physical and behavioral signs are not clearly obvious in detecting drug usage, drug tests can be used. The National Conference on Marijuana Use: Prevention, Treatment, and Research Conference Summary offers some insights into drug testing as an option for drug detection in their section entitled, "Science of Marijuana Testing." Also, we encourage you to learn more about the importance of treatment in our Treatment Works; The Washington State Experience! section.  "Offer teenagers safe ways to take risks and push themselves to their limits. Watch for indications of substance abuse: - extreme mood changes, loss of initiative or motivation, decreased energy, school grades slipping, unexcused absences, change of friends, withdrawal from family." (Taking care of teenagers, Northwest Health, Spring, 1998) "An Oregon biotech company and its Pennsylvania partner have won U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval of the nation’s first oral testing device for cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana. Epitope Inc. Of Beaverton produces the OraSure collection device, a specially treated pad placed between the cheek and gum. The pad absorbs mucosal transudate, a fluid that migrates into the mouth from blood vessels. The pad is then sealed in a case and sent to a laboratory for analysis." (New test for drugs uses pad placed in mouth, Columbian, Vancouver, March 12, 1998) "For parents who favor old-fashioned urinalysis, there is Dr. Brown’s Home Drug Testing System, approved last year by the FDA as the nation’s first nonprescription drug test. The test detects marijuana, PCP, amphetamines, cocaine, heroin, codeine and morphine." (New test for drugs uses pad placed in mouth, Columbian, Vancouver, March 12, 1998) "There are many home drug tests available today. Some are used on the suspected user’s urine, some on hair. In both cases, parents collect a sample, label it (using either their name or an anonymous ID code number), and send the sample to a lab. Results are ususally available by phone in a fews days. Kits range in price from under $10 to more than $60." (Testing your child for drugs, what you should know before you do it, Westchester Family, March, 1998) "In fact, according to Staci Leuschner, product manager for the home drug test, Parent’s Alert, the company’s founder invented the product after taking her own son to the emergency room for a drug test." (Testing your child for drugs, what you should know before you do it, Westchester Family, March, 1998,) "If parents test on a regular basis ...the tests can also be preventive, allowing teens to say ‘no" to drugs, by adding, "My parents use home drug testing: I’d better not" (The mere presence of these test kits on the market allows teens to use this excuse even if their parents don’t use the kits.) (Testing your child for drugs, what you should know before you do it, Westchester Family, March, 1998,) "However, according to Leuschner surprise is the last thing Parent’s Alert wants. 'It’s not something to spring on a kid. We want our product to help families band together,’ she says. Leuschner wants parents and children to establish a family drug policy before there’s a problem." (Testing your child for drugs, what you should know before you do it, Westchester Family, March, 1998,) |
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