How long does LSD show up in urine?

Answer 1

Urine.

LSD is not tested for in most common drug tests, it is very rarely tested for in the more expensive extensive tests. LSD can be tested for, but would require special tests that are very expensive, and are only good for detecting LSD up to 3 days after use, and are therefore not used unless the testers have a special need to test for it. It is rarely tested for outside of autopsies.

The US air force used to test for it, but has since stopped, as in the years that it was testing, it only found 4 people using it, and it was deemed financially unsound to test randomly for it. The air force now only tests pilots if they have a reason to suspect he may be using LSD.

Answer 2

LSD is not usually tested for in standard or advanced drug tests. Because of the tiny amounts involved and its rapid removal from the body, it is very difficult to detect. It stays in the urine for 24-48 hours.

From Erowid:

Urine Testing

It is possible to test for the presence of LSD in urine, but it is a very difficult and expensive test to run and is very uncommon. Unless there is a particular reason to be looking for it, as in the case of an autopsy...it is extremely unlikely that most people will ever run into this test. It is not one of the SAMHSA-5 standardly tested for in the basic drug test, nor is it included in the extended drug tests. It is not chemically similar to any of the drugs tested for, so should not trigger the tests as another substance.

Military

Beginning in the early 2000's, some parts of the military began testing for LSD. However, the Feb 18, 2008 Army Times reported that the Department of Defense has stopped LSD testing military wide. Reportedly this was because only four positive LSD tests were found out of more than 2 million test conducted over a three year period. A cost-benefit analysis resulted in the military ceasing LSD testing as part of their standard panel. Note that it is possible that non-standard tests are conducted in unique cases. We have been told that the Air Force will court martial airmen on the basis of a single positive test for LSD.

While LSD is still not included in the standard NIDA battery of tests, the price of testing for its presence has dropped considerably in the past few years. Many urine screening packages now include LSD in their standard battery.

From a1b2c3:

Drug Testing

LSD can show up in standard urine drug tests if used 1 to 3 days previous.

LSD and its metabolites were still detectable in human urine for as long as 4 days after the ingestion of 0.2 mg of the drug. [Faed, E.M., McLeod, W.R.: A urine screening test of lysergide. Journal of Chromatographic Science. 11, 4-6 (1973)]

Note that standard, cheap initial drug screening does not use chromatography or mass-spectrometry, and does not look for LSD.

Spinal taps are not particularly useful (cerebro-spinal fluid doesn't concentrate LSD or metabolites) and are never done under any circumstances: they are painful and dangerous.

You might want to mention that Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Urine Test has a table which claims lsd is detectable for 40 days. I'm almost sure this was a typo.

1] How long can LSD be detected in the body?

This varies by the test being used, the detection limit placed on the test, the point of collection and type of the sample fluid, the amount of LSD that was taken, and the individual in question.

Assuming the testers are using an RIA screening test with the cutoff set at 0.1 ng/ml and assuming that the user has recently emptied their bladder, then the detection limit for one hit (100 ug) is normally around 30 hours. Each doubling of the initial amount will add about 5 hours. Thus taking 8 hits will leave a user vulnerable for approximately 2 days. (NOTE: This is based on the data in [7])

2] What exact form of test can be used to detect LSD in the body? There are a number of tests which can be used to detect LSD in the body.

Abuscreen, a product of Roche Diagnostic Systems, is a series of RadioImmunoAssay (RIA) tests, one of which is used to detect LSD and its metabolites in whole blood, serum (blood), urine and stomach contents [1].

RIA can in theory be used to detect quantities as small as 0.020 nanograms (ng) per milliliter (ml) of sample [2]. Laboratory tests have shown that RIA results are accurate down to at least 0.1 ng/ml [3]. The manufacturer recommends limiting the cutoff to 0.5 ng/ml.

EMIT, a product of Syva Corporation, is another series of tests, one of which can be used to detect LSD and its metabolites in serum and urine. EMIT stands for Enzyme Multiplied Immunoassay Technique.

Both EMIT and Abuscreen are positive/negative response tests (much like pregnancy tests) which require periodic equipment calibration and consume chemicals for each test performed. A basic battery of tests costs approx. $15-$25 per person [4].

The basic tests (recommended by NIDA) include marijuana, cocaine, amphetamines, opiates, and phencyclidine (PCP). Normally, unless an (employer) specifically requests the test, an LSD assay is not run.

Both Roche and Syva recommend confirmation of positive results by using a different test. The usual method of confirming positive results is some form of chromatography.

HPTLC and GC/MS can be used to give quantitative results as opposed to the Boolean results from EMIT or Abuscreen.

Laboratory tests have shown that GC/MS test for LSD in urine[6] and blood[7] can be accurate down to 0.1 ng/ml. The cost for confirmation of a positive screening test is approximately $50-60.

Positive results to either EMIT and RIA are held to be probable cause by U.S. courts. GC/MS results are held to be proof by U.S. courts.

Immunoassays chemicals are created by injecting animals (rabbits, sheep, donkey, etc) with the drug to be tested for and an albumin which force the animal to produce antibodies.

In RIA tests, the antibodies are then added to the fluid sample with a radioactively labeled chemical.