Well you are schedule to take a drug test for your job but you have come down with a nasty cough and need to do something to quell that cough.  You can take some lozenges but you had better be careful if you plan to take any cough syrup with codeine in it.  You may unexpectedly test positive for opiates because of the codeine in the cough syrup. It is the same result with Tylenol with codeine.  You can test positive for opiates.

Now the time that codeine can be detected in your urine and saliva can vary depending upon your body weight and how often and how much cough syrup or anything with codeine in it you use.  For just a one time usage and someone with an average metabolism the detection time in the urine sample may be two to four days and in the saliva only up to about six to twelve hours.  It may be detected a little longer if you have a higher body mass and or have been using codeine for a longer period of time.

The acceptable cutoff level for codeine in a urinalysis is 2000 ng/ml. Codeine is often used with other medication to reduce coughing and sooth the throat pain from coughing, so you may think that you are taking just a simple cough medicine but it may contain codeine.  This may result in a positive test for opiates on a drug screen so it would behoove you to read the labels carefully.