In this post, we will talk about one of the biggest concerns which is ‘how soon can I take a pregnancy test’. The date on which the pregnancy test is performed is decisive, so that the result is reliable. It is a very special situation and sometimes anxiety can play a bad trick, so it is important to do it at the right time.
Blood Test
The most common test is the home pregnancy test that is bought at the pharmacy, but many women opt for a blood test because it is more accurate and reliable even before the first menstrual period occurs.
Both are able to detect the presence of the hormone chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). One does it in the blood while the other, in the woman’s urine. Quantitative blood tests detect very small levels of hCG, from 1 mIU/mL when urine test has an average sensitivity of 20 mIU/mL.
Therefore, since the embryo is implanted in the walls of the uterus and the body begins to produce the hormone of pregnancy, it can be detected by means of a blood test. You can get a precise result in a few hours, as well as determine the exact age of the fetus. You can also tell if it is an abnormal pregnancy such as an ectopic pregnancy, a molar pregnancy or a possible miscarriage.
Home pregnancy test if you are regular!
As we said, try to buy a test as sensitive as possible i.e. to detect the lowest concentration of hCG. For women with regular cycles, it is easier to calculate the right time. As expected, the woman has ovulated mid-cycle and implantation of the embryo has occurred between six and ten days after fertilization. Therefore, with a delay of one day on the expected date for the arrival of menstruation, levels of the hormone chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), which begin to rise after implantation, will already have reached a level detectable in urine.
Therefore, although there are tests that promise a result from the first week after conception, the most reliable thing is to do it with at least one day of delay. Although it can be done at any time of the day, it is also recommended to use the first urine of the day which has higher concentration.
Pregnancy test if you are not regular!
For women who do not have a regular cycle, the detection of pregnancy is complicated a little more than for the previous ones. There are very intuitive women who are sure to be pregnant even before the pregnancy test confirms it, but since not all of them are capable or need scientific confirmation, almost all of them use the pregnancy test.
Performing the test one day late may be too early to obtain a reliable result. You may have ovulated later than you thought, so it is advisable to obtain a reliable result, so perform the test one week after the expected date for your period.
What can happen if the pregnancy test is performed prematurely?
If you take the pregnancy test ahead of time what can happen is that you get a false negative. That is, the test says that you are not pregnant when in fact you are. What happens is that the presence of the hormone chorionic gonadotropin still is not detectable in the urine because its levels are very low.
However, the amount of hCG in urine in the first weeks of pregnancy can vary greatly from one woman to another. Therefore, if the test has proven negative and the absence of menstruation persists, you must repeat the test in three or four days.
Implantation Bleeding
It is important to know that some women may experience false bleeding or implantation bleeding that is confused with menstruation when it is actually a sign of pregnancy. Unlike this, implantation bleeding is a slight bleeding that lasts one or two days, at most three (never more than five) and is brown in color.
So now you know the answer to ‘How soon can I take a pregnancy test?’, so do it in the right way.
