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Why Does Not Clonazepam Show Up In The Drug Test?
Question: I have been taking Clonazepam 1 mg tablets 3 times a day for at least the last 10 years. I also take Norco 7.5 pills for severe arthritis and early stage of osteoporosis. I am 70 years old and my doctor requires drug screens. I had my appointment last Monday and they told me that the Clonazepam didn't show in my urine drug test. I told them I had been taking it as directed. They said it had happened 2 times recently and if I had been taking it regularly it would show up in my urine. I didn't want to be argumentative, and having returned recently from a funeral 300 miles from my home, I just wasn't sure what I did the day before. I had slept a lot during the day and night...I was really drained. So they reduced the amount they usually give me to 60 pills to be taken 2 times a day. I already am feeling the effects of why I was taking it. I now have problems sleeping...I wake up several times a night, can't get back to sleep because my mind wanders and I end up making lists of things I must do...it drives me nuts. I have TMJ really badly. My jaw is hurting and I have to lay on a pillow that keeps the jaw that is worst steady as much as I can, the other side I clinch my teeth on the other side and they are hurting. There are other little things that I think typically would call for the use of Clonazepam. That's why I am taking it. Why on earth would it not show on my urine test? I am getting too old to change medications because of this policy. I did have Weight loss surgery where they "stapled" my stomach. Does the absence of a stomach effect the length of a drug staying in the system? Also I have to take all kinds of vitamins and 2 multivitamins a day because I do not absorb the nutrients in my intestines. I just don't understand...and all I get as a reply from my doctor is "The DEA makes us do it." This same doctor makes me take these added vitamins because it shows up in blood work that I am not absorbing them.
Brief Answer:
Things that make you not absorb medications
Detailed Answer:
Thinning of skin that occurs with age also occurs on the inside. Thinning of the gut lining makes it absorb less. This isn't generally a problem with clonazepam as much as it is with VITAMIN B12...which I suspect you are not getting enough of. The vitamin generally needs to be injected if the gut isn't absorbing it. Age, also changes in the gut archetecture due to surgery. This would also generally be associated with not absorbing anything else and then having diarrhea, weight loss, vitamin deficiencies, etc.
Not getting the clonazepam in. Also forgetting some doses. also not taking it the morning of the urine test and taking it later in the day has more of an effect than the gut absorption. Also if the urine is dilute also if the test is not very sensitive. If it is the dip stick test, that one is very inaccurate due to how one runs it and how one reads it. Get a better test (the Gas CHromatograph, QUANTITATIVE TEST).
Getting the clonazepam out. Some drugs/conditions make the liver eat the clonazepam up faster. These include grilled food, dilantin. Rifampin and others.
Grapefruit juice has the opposite effect of increasing the amount of drug level. Other gut abnormalities affect absorption, but again, they also would cause diarrehea.
Then there is the sleep effect. Worries, not having the right sleeping conditions, betting used to and expecting sleep problems all contribut to poor sleep and clonazepam is not a great fix for them.
Things that make you not absorb medications
Detailed Answer:
Thinning of skin that occurs with age also occurs on the inside. Thinning of the gut lining makes it absorb less. This isn't generally a problem with clonazepam as much as it is with VITAMIN B12...which I suspect you are not getting enough of. The vitamin generally needs to be injected if the gut isn't absorbing it. Age, also changes in the gut archetecture due to surgery. This would also generally be associated with not absorbing anything else and then having diarrhea, weight loss, vitamin deficiencies, etc.
Not getting the clonazepam in. Also forgetting some doses. also not taking it the morning of the urine test and taking it later in the day has more of an effect than the gut absorption. Also if the urine is dilute also if the test is not very sensitive. If it is the dip stick test, that one is very inaccurate due to how one runs it and how one reads it. Get a better test (the Gas CHromatograph, QUANTITATIVE TEST).
Getting the clonazepam out. Some drugs/conditions make the liver eat the clonazepam up faster. These include grilled food, dilantin. Rifampin and others.
Grapefruit juice has the opposite effect of increasing the amount of drug level. Other gut abnormalities affect absorption, but again, they also would cause diarrehea.
Then there is the sleep effect. Worries, not having the right sleeping conditions, betting used to and expecting sleep problems all contribut to poor sleep and clonazepam is not a great fix for them.
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Above answer was peer-reviewed by :
Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar
Answered by
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