Hair Drug Testing in Burlington, WA

Extended Detection Window Testing for Individuals, Employers & Legal Matters

Hair drug testing reveals a longer history of substance use than a urine test can. At Fastest Labs of Burlington, we offer this service as part of our full menu of drug, alcohol, and DNA testing, available to individuals, employers, schools, and government agencies throughout Burlington and the broader Skagit County area. When you need a complete picture of drug use history, not just recent activity, hair testing can provide it.

Paired with a urine drug test, hair testing gives employers with zero-tolerance policies and legal professionals a comprehensive view of a client’s or applicant’s use patterns. We’re a locally operated Burlington facility backed by a national testing network.

Ready to schedule a hair drug test in Burlington, WA? Call us at (360) 677-3516 and we can walk you through what to expect.

Why Choose Fastest Labs of Burlington for Hair Testing

Our certified collectors handle each sample with precision and full confidentiality. Over more than a decade, we’ve built our reputation on clean facilities, short wait times, and accurate results, and that standard applies to every service we offer, including hair testing. We aim to keep wait times under five minutes, and our pricing makes quality testing affordable for everyone.

In most cases, hair drug test results are available the same day as sample submission to the lab, supporting time-sensitive hiring decisions and legal proceedings without unnecessary delays.

How Hair Drug Testing Works

Collection is straightforward. Our certified collector takes approximately 90 to 120 strands of hair, cut to 1.5 inches in length, from the scalp. That 1.5-inch sample corresponds to roughly 90 days of hair growth, which is why scalp hair testing screens for drug use within the past three months.

Body hair grows at a slower, more uniform rate. When body hair is used as the sample, the detection window can extend up to a year, which can be useful in legal or custody contexts where a longer history matters.

Panel options for hair testing include:

Panels ranging from 5-panel through 18-panel configurations
Screening for common substances as well as a wider range of less-common compounds at higher panel levels

Who Uses Hair Drug Testing in Washington

Employers with zero-tolerance drug policies use hair testing because it can surface patterns of use that a single-day urine test might not catch. Courts and probation programs rely on it for the same reason: the extended detection window can make it harder for someone to simply abstain for a few days before a scheduled test.

Hair testing isn’t a substitute for federally mandated Department of Transportation drug testing. DOT regulations currently authorize urine and oral fluid specimens for safety-sensitive transportation roles. Hair testing works alongside your drug-free workplace program as a complement to those requirements, not a replacement for them.

Washington Cannabis Law & Pre-Employment Hair Testing

Washington’s RCW 49.44.240, which took effect on January 1, 2024, restricts most employers from denying a job offer based on off-duty cannabis use or a pre-employment screen that detects non-psychoactive cannabis metabolites, whether in hair, urine, or other specimens.

The restriction has defined exceptions. It doesn’t protect applicants for positions requiring a federal background investigation or security clearance, law enforcement, fire service, corrections roles involving inmate custody, other first-responder positions, or roles the employer has designated as safety-sensitive before accepting applications. The law also applies only to pre-employment screening. Post-accident testing, reasonable-suspicion testing, and on-the-job impairment policies remain fully intact.

If you’re an employer in the Burlington or Mount Vernon area building or updating a drug-free workplace program, understanding how RCW 49.44.240 intersects with your testing protocols is worth discussing with legal counsel before you order tests.

Schedule Hair Drug Testing at Fastest Labs of Burlington

We serve Burlington, Mount Vernon, and the surrounding Skagit County area from our locally operated facility. Call (360) 677-3516 to schedule your hair drug test or ask about pairing it with urine testing for a fuller picture of drug use history.

What Hair Testing Can’t Tell You

Hair drug testing has real strengths, but it also has limits worth understanding. Because metabolites must travel from the bloodstream into the hair shaft as it grows, use within the last seven to ten days typically won’t appear in a scalp sample. The hair simply hasn’t grown long enough yet to carry those metabolites into the collectable portion.

There’s also no point-of-collection or instant-result option for hair, unlike urine testing. Every sample goes to a laboratory for analysis, and hair testing is best used to identify repeated or long-term patterns of substance use. It isn’t the right tool if you need to confirm or rule out use from the past week.

When the question is recent use, a urine test is the better fit. When the question is use history over the past 90 days or longer, hair testing can provide information urine can’t. Many employers and legal professionals use both for exactly that reason.

Continue Reading Read Less

Your Simple Testing Solution

1
Request Your Appointment
2
Visit Your Nearest Fastest Labs
3
Quickly Receive Your Test Results

Request An Appointment