Lisinopril is a very common medication used to treat high blood pressure. It was prescribed more than 100,000 times in 2017 in the U.S. alone.
Although lisinopril is not a commonly abused drug, it can show up on drug tests. If you are reading this, you might be curious about whether your lisinopril prescription could interfere with any drug screening you may encounter.
Keep reading to learn about how long lisinopril stays in your body and on lab tests.
How Long Do the Effects of Lisinopril Last?
Lisinopril is taken in the form of an oral pill. Once it is ingested, it will take a few hours before it begins to reduce your blood pressure. For lisinopril to be effective at managing blood pressure levels, it may need to be taken regularly for several consecutive days.
Lisinopril’s intended effect is to lower blood pressure. Ideally, it does so without adverse side effects or brain effects of any kind. Unfortunately, side effects from lisinopril are relatively common. They might include:
- Cough
- Runny nose
- Sneezing
- RashFatigue
- Dizziness
- Headache
- Sexual impotence
Although Lyrica’s intended blood pressure effects only last for a number of hours, these side effects could last for much longer than that. If you are experiencing any negative side effects from lisinopril, you should talk to your doctor.
How Long Does Lisinopril Stay in Lab Tests?
Lisinopril, although not commonly abused, is sometimes looked for by lab tests. There are multiple reasons you might be tested for lisinopril. Your doctor may want to be sure that you are taking the drug as recommended. In other cases, people who overdose on lisinopril need to be tested to ensure the cause of symptoms.
Several factors can affect the length of time that a drug like lisinopril will remain detectable by lab tests. They include:
- The dosage: People taking a higher dose of lisinopril may find that the drug takes longer to clear from their system.
- The duration of use: The longer you take lisinopril for, the more likely it is that the drug will ‘build-up’ in your system and stay on lab tests for longer.
- The frequency of use: If, for example, you are taking lisinopril twice a day rather than once a day, it is more likely to stay in your body for longer.
- Use of other substances: If you have other prescriptions, they may affect the amount of time that lisinopril stays in your system. Additionally, using alcohol and recreational drugs can affect processing times of lisinopril, usually by slowing them down.
- Metabolism: Human metabolism rates are complex and can vary according to a number of factors. When it comes to drugs like lisinopril, age, genetics, weight, and overall health all play a key role. The faster a person’s metabolism, the faster lisinopril will be removed from their system.
- The type of test: All drug tests are not created equal. Different sampling methods are capable of detecting past drug use for different amounts of time.
Let’s look at the types of drug tests that you may encounter in more detail:
How Long Does Lisinopril Stay in Your Urine?
Urine testing is the most common type of drug screening, for several reasons. Tests that use a urine sample are typically cheap, accurate, and have decent detection time frames for most substances. They are also non-invasive, meaning they do not require any sacrifice of body matter (aside from liquid waste).
A recently developed drug test uses urine sampling to make sure that patients with high blood pressure are taking their medication. Doctors can’t force you to take this test, but you should have no reason to avoid it as long as you are taking your medication as prescribed.
Most drugs show up on urine tests for a handful of days after the last dose.
How Long Does Lisinopril Stay in Your Hair?
Hair testing can detect past drug use for longer than any other type of test. It is not uncommon for drugs like lisinopril to be found on hair tests for 3 months or longer after the last time taken.
So, why don’t testers always use hair tests if their detection time is so long? There are a few drawbacks to these tests.
- They are more expensive.
- It takes a while for drug use to show up on hair tests, sometimes 2 weeks or more.
- They are more prone to false-positive results.
- Hair testing is more invasive than some other forms of testing, since it requires cutting or plucking of hair from the body or head.
How Long Does Lisinopril Stay in Your Blood?
Blood testing is the most accurate type of drug testing. This is because it gives a direct reading of the concentration of a substance in the blood. However, this also means that blood tests can’t detect drug use for as long as other forms of testing.
The half-life of lisinopril is around 12 hours. Generally, drugs will show up on a test for 4 to 5 half-lives. In the case of lisinopril, this means that it should be detectable by drug tests for 2 to 3 days after the last time taken.
How Long Does Lisinopril Stay in Your Saliva?
Saliva tests are, arguably, the least invasive form of drug screening. A simple cotton swab from the inside of the cheek is all that is needed to conduct one of these tests.
Because the test is so quick and easy to administer, it is common for police officers in the field to use saliva testing when they need to check for drug use ‘on the fly’.
Being tested for lisinopril via your saliva is extremely unlikely. If it does happen, you should expect detection times to be about the same as blood testing. In the case of lisinopril, this means 3 days or so.
Can You Detox From Lisinopril Faster?
There’s nothing you can do to speed up the process of lisinopril detox. You simply need to let nature run its course.
When it comes to lisinopril, how long it lasts in your body will depend on the factors discussed above. To recap, these include:
- How you used lisinopril
- Age
- Health
- Weight
- Metabolism
- The type of drug test
If you want to stop taking lisinopril, call Northeast Addictions Treatment Center to talk about your options. It is likely that they will place you on a different blood pressure medication if lisinopril is causing unwanted side effects.
