A pregnancy test can tell whether you're pregnant by checking a sample of your urine (pee) or blood for a specific hormone. The hormone is called human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). High levels of hCG are a sign of pregnancy. hCG increases quickly in the first ten weeks after a fertilized egg attaches to the inside wall of the uterus.
Urine tests for pregnancy are most accurate when you do the test a week or two after you've missed your menstrual period. If you take a urine test too close to the time you got pregnant, the test could say that you are not pregnant even when you really are. That's because your body may not yet have made enough hCG to show up on the test.
You can have an hCG urine test at your health care provider's office or you can do the test yourself with an at-home test kit. These tests are basically the same, so many people use a home pregnancy test before calling their provider. If you follow the instructions carefully, home pregnancy tests are about 97-99% accurate. They can give you the results in minutes.
Blood tests for pregnancy can be done at your provider's office or a lab. These tests can find very small amounts of hCG, so they can accurately show whether you're pregnant before you've missed your period. But hCG blood tests aren't commonly used to check for pregnancy. That's because urine tests are less expensive, very accurate, and provide quicker results than blood tests. hCG blood test results may take hours to more than a day.
Other names: human chorionic gonadotropin test, HCG test, qualitative hCG blood test, quantitative hCG blood test, Beta-hCG urine test, total chorionic gonadotropin, hCG total OB
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