Hiding the signs of substance abuse
Here’s a fun little thought experiment…
Say you were in a room full of 100 people and half were under the influence of methamphetamine and the other half were not. If you were allowed a one-minute interaction with each person, what do you think the odds would be that you could successfully identify the 50 substance abusers? You’re probably thinking you have a pretty good success rate. Right?
Now take the same scenario except this time half the people could be abusing nearly any drug – cocaine, marijuana, opiates, PCP, alcohol, MDMA, K2 or other synthetic cannabanoids. Are you still as confident you could identify them?
What if you knew that nearly every one of the drug abusers has taken great effort to hide or mask the effects of their abuse. Are you a little less confident?
What if we said that all of them were long-time abusers; highly functional while under the influence. Confidence still dropping?
What if we said that many of the substance abusers took other drugs to mask the effects of the primary drug they are abusing? Maybe the meth users also took opiates or ingested THC to mask their hyperactivity? Confident dropping again?
When you consider all these additional variables together you end of with something more representative of what supervisors are dealing with in the real world. Substance abusers have a lot to lose and will spend vast quantities of time and effort finding ways to hide their abuse. They talk with friends. They share stories and ideas on anonymous discussion boards. They’ll mask odors with mints, mouthwash or fragrance. They’ll wear glasses or colored contacts to hide their pupils. They’ll feign illness. Anything and everything to hide their abuse. One popular drug discussion board on the web has nearly 400,000 views on various topics related to drug use and drug testing.
It’s critical then that supervisors have been well-trained to spot the common signs and symptoms of abuse. If they have not been well trained, it will be far too easy for them to second guess their instincts and take the path of least resistance which is to avoid confrontation. To help ensure a safe and healthy workplace we should be matching the efforts of the abusers. This might mean training your supervisors frequently on the signs and symptoms of abuse. Repetition increases retention. Advertisers understand this well. Web-based supervisor training programs are often available for 6-12 months so supervisors can re-access the training material as needed.
Food for thought:
60% of the worlds illegal drugs are consumed by Americans.
Nearly 75% of those users are employed (almost 13 million users).
More than 60% of people know someone who has gone to work under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
AtHandTraining.com provides online DOT and drug free workplace supervisor and employee drug awareness training that works on any browser or device.
Sources: http://drugabuse.com/library/workplace-drug-abuse/ | http://www.dol.gov/elaws/asp/drugfree/benefits.htm
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