Can ketones cause false positive?

Nurses Recovery

Updated:   Published

I've been following a low carb diet recently, and the goal is to get into ketosis, measured by using Ketostix. I have been selected to test today, option 1. Is it possible that if I have ketones in my urine because of the low carb diet, that it will somehow read positive for alcohol? I vaguely remember reading something like this but I can't find a definitive answer. I may be eating a candy bar here in a few minutes!

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Women's Health, LTC.

I wondered the same thing a few years back. I did some reading and research. What I heard was no, it cannot. But who knows these days with the sensitivity of the new drug testing methods.

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Specializes in OR.

Hmmm....I don't think so. I eat high protein, low carb (not exactly purposely pushing for ketosis) because I have weird GI issues in that eating like that keeps me feeling better. I also exercise quite a bit so I am an avid consumer of protein shakes. I've never had issues with anything in these dumb tests.

I reckon it's one more thing to be paranoid over.

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No, I had false positive once and had to talk to mro and asked about ketones. He said absolutely not do high or low ketones affect a drug test of any kind.

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Good because over the last few months I've been becoming the abominable fatty. I'm going low carb presently

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Kel65 said:
No, I had false positive once and had to talk to mro and asked about ketones. He said absolutely not do high or low ketones affect a drug test of any kind.

Ok, good to know! I'm sitting in the Quest waiting room, so I guess I'll know for sure in a couple days!

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Recovering_RN said:
Ok, good to know! I'm sitting in the Quest waiting room, so I guess I'll know for sure in a couple days!

Nah, you are good. I did less than 10 grams of carbs a day ketogenic for like 10 months in the program and I never had an issue. Always had ketosis on my AM test strips, never had a pee test issue.

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When we did recovery trek I saw my creatinine climb due to a low carb diet. I'm doing a low carb diet again and tested abnormal. But idk what for. The last time was a low creatinine. This time I'd imagine it'd be too high. I don't know why else it would be abnormal. But today is sunday, won't know until tomorrow. But it's kind of freaking me out

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I always assumed the low creatinine was a problem because it's a sign that you are drinking a lot of water, and they assume that you did that in order to try to dilute your urine on purpose, because you drank alcohol or used drugs and you're hoping it won't show up if it's dilute enough. A high creatinine shouldn't be a problem, at least not one that would raise any kind of red flag about possible illicit substance use. I've been doing keto for a month now and my last test was negative.

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High creatinine is not a problem. Mine hit 325 one test. Strangely enough it was the quickest I ever got test results back.

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I'm also doing the keto diet right now. Haven't had any problems with testing except a couple weeks ago I had my bullet proof coffee before checking to see if I had to test. Later I had some exogenous ketones and accidentally took the ones with caffeine then didn't test until 4pm. Mine came back dilute.....sufficed to say, the extra ketones did nothing to my test but the caffeine did dilute my urine. I've never had any issues with creatinine (even when not on the keto diet) as long as I have a protein shake or bar an hour before I test.

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I'm late to this posting. Just wanted to share. I did a strict Paleo diet for three months. Tested urine the entire time with strips and had ketones present most days. Never had false positive in about seven drug tests during that time.

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