Employee Drug Testing

DOT's Laboratory Quality Assurance Program Not Fully Implemented Gao ID: GGD-89-80 September 29, 1989

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Transportation's (DOT) employee drug-testing program, focusing on its compliance with regulations requiring blind performance tests to assess laboratory accuracy.

GAO found that: (1) regulations required agencies to implement blind performance tests by July 10, 1988, but DOT did not do so until July 18, 1989; (2) from July 1, 1988 through June 30, 1989, DOT collected about 16,000 employee urine samples, of which 99 were confirmed positive for illegal drugs; (3) DOT should have included 1,250 blind samples along with the real samples, but only submitted between 74 and 79 blind samples; and (4) DOT noncompliance demonstrated the need for continuing oversight and independent monitoring.



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