At this juncture, it has become very important to monitor employee’s substance abuse and laws like the Drug-Free Work Place Act were made to help employers. Employers can now, by law, monitor an employee’s drug addiction with the help of organizations which deal with drug rehab services for employees.
The following are some of the services rendered by drug rehab centres to the businesses:
1. Policy development on substance abuse
2. Explaining the policy to the employees
3. Providing managers with the required training to handle drug abuse situations
4. Providing treatment and support along with rehabilitation
5. Conducting substance abuse screening for to-be employees, existing employees on a regular basis; sometimes, randomly and “for-cause” basis
Policy Development
Employers cannot undertake drug and alcohol screening of an employee unless they have a solid policy in place. Drug rehab services help the employer develop a drug abuse policy depending on their business and help them implement the policy without a glitch.
The policy is developed by taking the following things into consideration:
· Organization’s culture, nature and potential hazards of the business
· Going through the organization’s history and identifying drug abuse incidents and preparing a plan to avoid similar mishaps in the future
· Complete assessment of the potential drug abuse risks to the business and including certain regulations in the policy which can avoid these risks in the future
· Planning and implementation of the policy
· Explaining the same to the employees and motivating them towards a better lifestyle and letting them know of the penalties if they fail to comply with the policy in place
. Explaining the policy to the employees and training managers
While implementing any new policy, it is imperative to brief the new policy rules and regulations to the staff. Drug rehab services handle this task on behalf of the organization. Apart from this service, they also train the senior level management on how to identify and deal with an employee who is not abiding by the policy and how to deal with other situations which have resulted due to substance abuse.
Drug rehab services also include preparing modules to train the senior level management. These modules include:
· How to identify substance abuse
· Making them understand their role in the implementation of the policy
· Making them understand the drug screening procedures and help them gain confidence to arrange random screenings in conjunction with minimal or no disagreement with employees
Screening Services for Substance Abuse
Screening services include many types and are discussed in detail below. However, screening tests can only determine if an employee has taken drugs recently. It cannot determine if the employee is an addict or is unfit to work. These tests should be conducted in such a way that they are ethical and also should be legally defensible. Though there is a range of sampling methods the standard screening service remains to be a urine test. Drug rehab services offer the following types of screening services:
· Pre-Employment Drug Abuse Screening: Many companies use this screening as part of their employment process. This type of screening will confirm if the potential employee has misused drugs before attending the recruitment process. Sample collection can be done at the drug rehab centres or at a convenient place on the office premises. If tested positive, whether or not to employ the potential candidate is solely at the company’s discretion.
· Random Screening: This type of screening involves collecting the urine samples of the employees to find out if there is any drug abuse without any prior intimation. The donor’s dignity in all such screenings is duly respected.
· For Cause Screening: This type of drug abuse screening is done after a mishap. This is normally done to find out whether the unfortunate incident took place as a result of drug abuse.
Irrespective of the drug rehab services offered by rehab recovery it is strongly recommended that businesses have a strong drug abuse policy in place to avoid work place mishaps and help run the business smoothly which rehab recovery can help with.