How Long Does Weed Stay in Your System According to Science? (Blood, urine, saliva, hair) [OxDe848UA1I]
Studies show that weed stays in your system for months because of its fat-soluble nature. Drug tests can detect marijuana for up to 5 weeks in your urine after a single usage. Watch to find out how long THC stays in your system according to science.
Scientific studies show that
Urine drug tests can detect weed for 30 days after marijuana use.
THC can be detected in saliva for three days.
Since marijuana metabolites are highly fat-soluble, the body can store them in fat cells for months.
Marijuana can be detected in hair for up to three years.
Based on scientific studies, this video will explain why marijuana stays in your system for such a long period of time.
THC in the blood.
According to marijuana research, it takes about seven days to remove half of the THC metabolites (following one dose) from the body.
Complete elimination of a single dose may take up to 30 days.
In a National Institute on Drug Abuse study, six people were required to smoke marijuana cigarettes for three days of testing.
The researchers then tested the subjects for the concentration of THC in the blood.
The cutoff level for detection was 0.5 ng/ml.
According to this study, THC and 11-OH-THC were detectable in the blood for up to 27 hours.
THC-COOH was detectable in the blood for up to 168 hours, or seven days.
THC in urine.
Another study from the National Institute on Drug Abuse involved 60 regular cannabis users.
These subjects were asked to terminate their weed use for up to 30 days.
Researchers tested the subjects’ urine for THC-COOH with a cutoff level of 50ng/ml.
The longest point of detection was 29 days.
One of the subject members’s detection rates remained between 60% and 100% for 28 days after the first negative urine test.
This means that even if your urine drug test results were negative, you could still test positive in the future.
THC in saliva.
When you smoke or eat edibles, THC metabolites stick to the oral cavity and stay there for a period of time after consumption.
This is the only source of THC in saliva because THC is not later reabsorbed back into the saliva from the bloodstream.
Research has been conducted where participants were required to smoke cigarettes containing 14-44 mg of THC.
The concentration of THC in saliva was tested soon after.
The peak concentration of THC was within 2 hours after smoking, with the concentration being gradually reduced until it read below one mg/L (after ~22 hours).
In a different study participants were required to take capsules containing 5-15 mg of THC.
After their consumption, the concentrations of THC in the oral fluid were deficient, almost undetectable.
The cutoff level of saliva drug screening tests depends on the device used.
The lowest cutoff level is 0,015 mg/L.
Unfortunately, there are no studies that last more than 24 hours.
According to the data from this study, we can assume that the concentration will drop below the detectable level within 48 hours.
It may take more time for this concentration to drop for heavy marijuana users.
THC in hair.
THC enters the hair through tiny blood vessels into the growing hair cells.
In regularly shampooed hair without any treatment THC is well detected for at least one year after intake.
One long term hair study found drug presence more than three years after ceased consumption.
If we cut the hair into sections, it is possible to obtain information on the pattern of marijuana use.
This means we can use the cross sections of hair to figure out whether there was an increase, decrease, or constant usage of weed.
THC in Body Fat
We will use THC here as a name for THC and its metabolites, 11-COOH-THC and 11-OH-THC.
As we already mentioned, THC is highly fat-soluble, and body fat tissues absorb roughly 70% of the THC from the blood.
According to one study, the absorption half-life of THC from plasma is 50 seconds.
This means that during the 50 seconds after smoking, 50% of all THC in the blood will be absorbed by body fat.
THC is then slowly released from the fat into the blood and metabolized by the liver.
The more weed you consume, the more THC accumulates in fat tissues and the more time it takes to release it for excretion.
If your body does not use fat as an energy source, it will not break down the fat cells, meaning that THC will remain in those cells for months after use.
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