Taking a pregnancy test

Even though many of the home pregnancy tests advertise that you can perform them days before you even miss a period, once you understand how these tests work, you’ll see why that might not be the best idea.

hCG

There is a pregnancy hormone called hCG which the placenta produces after the embryo attaches itself to the uterine wall. The detection of this hormone is what causes a pregnancy test to be positive. The different home pregnancy tests each have a different sensitivity to this hormone and so each pregnancy test is able to detect it at different levels.

As the embryo attaches itself to the uterine wall several days after conception it is not going to be at the same time with every woman. Furthermore, sometimes attached embryos dislodge for unknown reasons, perhaps because they just aren’t equipped to grow and thrive and consequently they are eliminated through the menstrual cycle.

So it is possible to get a positive pregnancy test result and then for the embryo to detach and the menstrual cycle to begin which does happen and the woman is often left thinking the test was inaccurate when in reality it was accurate.

Why a False Negative

Another pregnancy test result is when the woman gets a negative result because the embryo hasn’t attached itself yet and the hCG hasn’t entered the woman’s system. If the test isn’t repeated again once the embryo attaches itself to the uterine wall, it may be sometime before the woman learns that she is indeed pregnant.

Therefore, it is much better to wait until you have missed your period and for at least a few days after that so that you can get an accurate result. No pregnancy test can detect what is not there and our bodies are not going to make the hormone faster just because technology has advanced so much.

We can avoid a lot of heartache by being patient in the first place. Even if you do take the test before you even miss your period, you will likely have to repeat it. As a false positive is rare, more often than not, you may get a false negative because the hCG hasn’t been detected yet and you will then still wonder if you could be pregnant and so you will want to repeat the test in a few days.

By waiting in the first place to take that first pregnancy test you will save yourself a lot of heartache and frustration.