With paper forms, Drug Free Sport found that "the potential for error was fairly high," Uryasz said, possibly with an error rate of up to 10 percent. "It was fairly simple with paper to get a signature and then get the wrong date or to transpose a number in handwriting, which can cause a positive drug test to be thrown out," he said.

Handheld collections have "virtually eliminated errors," he said. With about 40 collection crews and 25,000 tests a year, the recording of data and testing are also more efficient, down to about 10 minutes per athlete, he said.

Drug Free Sport upgraded to Dolphins after TSG did an assessment in 2004. It had been using a handheld from Palm Inc. upgraded with a bar code scanner from Symbol Inc. TSG found that the development platform used for the prior application would no longer be available, making upgrades limited, said Michael Koos, president of TSG.

TSG and Drug Free Sport assessed a number of replacement devices, including tablet PCs, small laptops, smart phones and several rugged handhelds from other device makers, including Symbol. Both companies liked the Dolphin because all the applications were self-contained, including the scanner, and because there wouldn't be compatibility worries with the Windows Mobile 2003 operating system and the .Net compact development framework.

Uryasz said the Dolphin has proved to be the right size, since it is larger than many pocket handhelds and can easily be used by people with larger hands. "For a 300-pound lineman getting a test, it's better than a little Palm device and you feel [this Dolphin] isn't going to get crushed," he said.