Home Pregnancy Test

HCG, or human chorionic gonadotropin, is a hormone made by the pregnancy that can be detected in the mother's blood or urine even before the woman's missed period. This hormone is what we look for with a "pregnancy test".

Can medication affect home pregnancy tests

Medication will neither delay a positive result, nor cause a false positive, unless the medication contains hCG (Profasi, Pregnyl, Novarel). This includes pain relievers, antibiotics, etc.

You should alse get an accurate result if you are on oral contraceptives. The hormones in the pill do not cause a false positive or a false negative result

hCG Levels

In general, the HCG level will double every 2-3 days in early pregnancy.

HCG levels peak at about 8-10 weeks of pregnancy and then decline, remaining at lower levels for the rest of the pregnancy.

See the table below for hCG levels study carried out by Dr. Sherbahn that compared HCG levels for single pregnancies.

How accurate is it

A doctors office test is usually equivalent to the first tier of the home pregnancy tests - reading an hCG level of 15-25 mIU as positive. In fact, they are often the same tests used at home, only with less packaging.

An October 2001 JAMA article (JAMA. 2001;286:1759-1761) said the highest possible screening sensitivity for an hCG-based pregnancy test conducted on the first day of a missed period is 90 percent, as 10 percent of women may not have implanted yet. The authors estimate that the highest possible screening sensitivity of a home pregnancy test by one week after the first day of the missed period is 97 percent.

Performing a test

You should use midstream urine - meaning you should pee a little first and then either hold the test stick in your urine stream or use a collection cup. If you would like to collect urine in a cup even though you bought a stick test, you need to hold the absorbant tip of the stick in the cup of urine for 5-10 seconds (TCPI, Inc. says this is more accurate for their tests). Otherwise follow the directions with the test.

Read your test documentation to interpret the results.

Day after HCG or LH Average
mIU/ml
High
mIU/ml
Low
mIU/ml
#
14 48 119 17 12
15 59 147 17 18
16 95 223 33 23
17 132 429 17 21
18 292 758 70 19
19 303 514 111 23
20 522 1690 135 13
21 1061 4130 324 12
22 1287 3279 185 22
23 2034 4660 506 13
24 2637 10000 540 16

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How a home pregnancy test works


How does a home pregnancy test work and how accurate is it
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