So here you are, facing a drug test in a few days and deciding on what to do about it. Somebody told you to drink a lot of water, your friend said pickle and cranberry juices are the best things since sliced bread, and somebody else mentioned a failed diluted sample, so now you at a loss. Well, let’s review.

When drinking a lot of  water, cranberry juice and so on, your kidneys speed up the secretion of water from you body, so you urinate more often and get a false impression that the urine is getting cleansed. The technical term for this procedure is “over-hydration” which dilutes the drug metabolites concentration in the urine sample and with that it will lower the creatinine – a substance that is constantly excreted into urine as a by-product of muscles’ metabolism. When creatinine level is low, it arouses the suspicion of a tempered sample, and they might do a check for gravity of a sample as well. The specific gravity is a proportion between the concentrations of dissolved solids (like salt) for a measurement of urine. When the sample is diluted with water, specific gravity reading is below the standard, thus confirming the alarming low creatinine levels and the sample is refused “tampered.”

Specialized detox drinks contain balanced natural ingredients that help you flush the urinary tract, but also keep the sample from being diluted. Also, keep in mind that consuming large amounts of water or drinking any diuretics can be harmful for people with kidney or liver dysfunctions, pregnant women or diabetics.