Employee attitudes toward drug testing: Effects of individual characteristics and employment setting

Testing for the presence of drug continues to gain popularity as a method for controlling drug use in the workplace. It is important that employers understand how potential applicants and current employees will react to the various types and purposes of drug testing. Employees (n = 529) were interviewed to investigate the role of attitudes toward drugs and work setting characteristics in explaining acceptance or rejection of drug testing. Individuals believing users should be held responsible for becoming dependent on cocaine, who felt the primary cause of cocaine addiction was weak moral character, and those who felt cocaine users should be treated as criminals were more supportive of drug screening and the testing of current employees.     

南方医科大学南方医院住院病人退药情况分析及其对策

目的:了解我院住院病人退药情况,分析退药原因,为减少并规范临床退药提供参考。方法:收集我院2011年1-4月的住院病人退药申请单1341张,对退药原因,退药科室和药品种类进行统计分析。结果:消化科,普外科和血液科居前三位;病人临时出院,医生更改医嘱和医嘱录入错误是主要原因;抗微生物药的退药频次最高。结论:应规范医疗行为,加强用药管理,建立健全的退药制度,加强医、药、护、患的沟通,减少退药发生。     

浅析国家基本药物制度与合理用药的关系

国家基本药物制度与合理用药的方向和目标是一致的,且对合理用药的实践有促进作用。目前我国基本药物制度在推进合理用药的过程中,在遴选、推行、监管、评价、宣传等方面存在一些不足,基本药物制度的实施体系需要进一步完善,以更好地促进我国合理用药水平的提高。     

美国药品淘汰机制对我国药品淘汰管理的启示

目的:通过了解美国的药品淘汰机制,为完善我国的药品淘汰管理提供一些建议。方法:分析比较美国的药品淘汰制度。结果和结论:我国的药品监督管理部门有必要进一步明确药品淘汰的概念与内涵,进一步完善药品淘汰制度,保证疗效不确、不良反应大或者其他原因危害公众健康的药品及时从市场撤出,包括那些危害大于益处的药品。     

Drug testers versus nontesters: Human resources managers’ perceptions and organizational characteristics

Survey responses from 134 human resources managers (50 from drug testing and 84 from nontesting organizations) indicated that representatives from drug testing organizations were no less likely than their counterparts from nontesting organizations to know that drug tests cannot assess performance impairment. However, awareness of this limitation of drug testing was associated with greater perceptions of testing as invasive of privacy and unsound for dealing with drug use in the workplace. The prevalence of drug testing was related to organizational size and industry type, but unrelated to perceptions of employee’s drug use. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Who is at Greatest Risk of Work-Related Discrimination—Women, Blacks, or Homosexuals?

This study was developed to examine whether bias against women, blacks, and homosexuals emerges in predictable patterns when raters are presented with hiring scenarios. We instructed the research sample to hire six of eight candidates for an accounting position. Eight candidates were necessary to offer the full range of gender, race, and sexual orientation combinations. Requiring the research sample to select six of the eight candidates meant that each respondent would have to discriminate by eliminating the two candidates they considered the least desirable. We found that a black, male homosexual is the most likely target of discrimination and the white, female heterosexual is the least likely to be discriminated against. If it develops that these findings hold across a wide range of work-related decisions and samples, such results would support the argument for maintaining affirmative action for blacks and extending civil-rights protection to gays and lesbians.     

Managing Workplace Gambling—Some Cautions and Recommendations

Workplace gambling is rapidly becoming a new American addiction. It is difficult to detect, since it may show no distinguishing characteristics until it is well advanced. Most gamblers never become a problem to employers, but those who do may inflict serious damage in the form of theft, creative bookkeeping, embezzlement, low productivity and workplace disruption. Few laws, specifically control gambling, but several laws written to address other issues, may apply to gambling also. Some of these laws are in the process of being reinterpreted, and broader interpretations may include pathological gamblers. In addition to its legal aspects there are important and costly economic issues associated with workplace gambling. Well trained, observant supervisors can detect and aid workplace gamblers, saving both employer and employee time, money and anguish.     

A better approach by management in drug testing

Discussed here are a number of drug abuse and drug testing issues. This article presents an overview of current developments in the area of drug testing in the workplace. There is an analysis of legislation, federal and state court decisions, and key legal arguments. These decisions and arguments are discussed in the context of employee rights and responsibilities. Also presented are the legal and ethical aspects of drug testing in the workplace. The authors make a case for a rehabilitative rather than a punitive approach to employee drug abuse.     

A labor perspective on fair pay: High-performance work at Corning,Inc.

The Corning-American Flint Glass Workers Union (AFGWU) partnership agreement provides a test case for the possibility of a more egalitarian and productive workplace. However, a conflict over fair compensation for high-performance work could become a major barrier to the realization of that promise. A model of fair pay is suggested, proposing that a goal of minimizing the job and pay hierarchy and maximizing the return for employee contributions would facilitate “ethical partnership” and create incentives for high-performance work. Former Shop Steward, Executive Board member, President of AFGWU Local 1000, Corning, New York. (Organizational affiliation given for identification purposes only. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and in no manner, whether written or implied, represent a view that is endorsed or sanctioned by the AFGWU.)     

Drug testing in the workplace: An overview of legal and philosophical issues

This article examines a range of legal and philosophical issues related to the drug-testing debate. The discussion of legal issues includes potential litigation on constitutional grounds (for public employees), statutory and tort grounds, or on the basis of civil rights legislation. Arbitration standards are also examined for situations involving unionized employees. The article further highlights pragmatic issues including the accuracy and costs (economic and noneconomic) of drug tests as well as the distinction between a positive drug test and impaired performance. Finally, the article addresses the delicate balance between an employer's right to unimpaired performance and an employee's right to privacy.     

药品价格管理政策综述

本文阐述国际上通行的几种药品价格管理政策,总结了我国药品价格管理政策的历史和现状,最后对我国药品价格管理政策的趋势做出预测。     

Violence in the Workplace—A Review with Recommendations

Workplace violence is a serious, growing and costly problem for American business and industry. In spite of the scope of the problem managers have been slow to respond, in fact appear to be in a state of denial. Profiles of both perpetuators and victims of workplace violence have been developed, but these profiles are so inclusive as to include almost everyone. Many causes have been recognized, most of which are related to stress. The courts offer only limited assistance; in fact, some laws limit tests and measures that might help identify violent employment candidates and employees. There are recommended courses of action intended to prevent workplace violence but little assurance that they can prevent it. Most of these approaches address the root causes of violence by focusing on stress.     

医院静脉药物集中配置管理实施体会

目的:探讨医院通过开展静脉药物配置中心管理,进一步完善静脉药物配置中心工作的发展,以促进医院管理更完善。方法:通过配置中心的工作体会,分析本院静脉药物配置中心管理工作中的一些环节。结果:落实静脉药物配置中心管理的各个环节,不仅确保了静脉药物配置的质量,还有效提高了临床药物质量的合理性、安全性和有效性。结论:静脉药物配置中心通过加强药品配送信息化管理以发挥其配药的优势,不仅推动了临床药学工作的发展,更确保了患者用药的安全性、合理性和有效性。     

A model of employee responses to drug-testing programs

Testing employees for drug use is an increasingly widespread organizational response to the problem of employee drug abuse. Despite this, little attention has been given to its effects on employee attitudes and behavior. This paper reviews the issue of drug testing in industry, provides a theoretical model of employee perceptions of and responses to drug-testing programs, and offers an agenda for future research directions.     

Free expression in the workplace: Does the public-private distinction matter?

This article presents an argument for a judicial approach to ward employee free speech cases that would afford private sector employees substantially greater free speech protection. The argument proceeds first by examining a recent case,Novosel v. Nationwide Insurance Company, which if followed widely as precedent would make the public-private distinction much less important in employee free speech cases. This examination results in a strong endorsement of theNovosel decision. A clear statement of the reasons for the endorsement, however, takes one far beyond the opinion of the court into an analysis of the conditions under which courts may rely upon public policy as a basis for decision.     

Effects of workplace bullying on work engagement and health: the mediating role of job insecurity

This study examined the effects of exposure to workplace bullying on work engagement and health problems. It is one of the few studies to treat job insecurity as an explanatory factor of the bullying–outcome relationship. Specifically, we perceive that job insecurity unfolds through an interpersonal process in which negative experiences, such as bullying, make employees feel less valuable in their workplace. By analyzing the data from employees in Korea using the latent factor approach, the tested mediation model explained that exposure to workplace bullying decreased the work engagement of employees and increased their health problems because of their high level of perceived job insecurity. The relationship between bullying and engagement would not be established without the job insecurity variable, thereby suggesting its indirect effect. Given the partial mediating effect of health problems, job insecurity is identified as an additional underlying mechanism that explains why bullying increases health problems. This finding does not contradict the widespread arguments on the health-impairing effect of workplace bullying. This study contributes to the literature and business practices by identifying an important underlying mechanism that helps us understand the association between exposure to workplace bullying and key work outcomes.     

Balancing Civil Rights With Safety at Work: Workplace Violence and the ADA

Workplace violence has become an increasingly common occurrence in recent years. During the years 1992–1996, there were over 5,000 job-related homicides in the United States, and in 1996 alone there were 1,364 nonfatal assaults committed by coworkers or former coworkers. Although it would be both inaccurate and inappropriate to suggest that these acts have generally been committed by persons suffering from severe emotional and mental disorders, this is clearly one of the possible explanations. In light of these facts and given the recent Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's Guidance on the Americans with Disabilities Act and Psychiatric Disabilities, the obligations and prerogatives of employers in terms of hiring and posthiring actions need to be discussed. This paper examines the legal issues, the EEOC's Guidance, and offers specific suggestions for developing an effective hiring process, as well as methods to use when dealing with current employees who pose a threat of violence because of mental and emotional disorders.     

An analysis of the drug testing decision

Two separate investigations were undertaken to better understand the factors that should be considered in the drug testing decision. In the first study, organizations were surveyed by telephone and were asked to identify the factors considered when making their decision. Safety seemed to be the most important reason for favoring a drug testing program, while employee rights was one of many reasons for not implementing a testing program. In the second study, the interest was in determining the impact of drug testing on the applicants' willingness to join the organization. It was found that salary was the most important factor, but that the drug testing policy did affect the job choice of about 20% of the students.     

The union response to employer-initiated drug testing programs

The testing of employees for drugs has become a major workplace issue in the late 1980s. By all accounts, many firms have implemented, or at least considered, some sort of drug screening program. While various experts have debated the importance and necessity of initiating such programs, there has been only limited investigation of the differences between union and nonunion workplaces in how such programs are initiated and administered. This article investigates some questions related to those differences. The first part examines the differences between union and nonunion workplaces and their implementation of drug screening programs. We present differences derived primarily from the fact that nonunion employers are constrained only by constitutional and statutory law in their introduction and implementation of drug screening programs. Unionized employers, on the other hand, are constrained by collective bargaining and the grievance resolution process. The second part of the article examines union responses to employer-initiated drug testing programs. The third part examines arbitration decisions on drug testing provisions in unionized workplaces. We outline the major areas in which arbitrators have rendered decisions, including definitions of behavior that could trigger reasonable suspicion testing and whether the employer has the right to unilaterally institute or expand drug testing programs.     

Evaluations of Drug-Testing Programs

In three experiments undergraduate students at an urban university evaluated drug-testing programs described in scenarios. Evaluations were inversely related to the false positive rate and were more favorable when a positive test result led to rehabilitation than when it led to termination of employment. Inconsistent effects on evaluations were observed for ability of the test to distinguish between previous drug use and current drug-based impairment, false negative rate, and implications of drug-impaired performance for public safety. There was also mixed evidence concerning the relation between evaluations and respondent belief in a just world. These results provide some support for Crant and Bateman's (1989) justice-based model of reactions to drug-testing and have implications for organizational drug-testing policies.