Are Pregnancy Test Strips Accurate? How to Improve the Accuracy of Pregnancy Test Strips?
The early pregnancy test strip is an effective means to help clinically determine pregnancy. The detection principle is to detect urine hCG to confirm whether a woman is pregnant. hCG, or human chorionic gonadotropin, is a glycoprotein produced by the placenta during pregnancy and can be excreted in urine through the glomerulus. Conducting a self-test for early pregnancy at night may, to some extent, affect the accuracy, and using morning urine will yield a more accurate result.
The accuracy of early pregnancy test strips is relatively high. Here are some tips to improve its accuracy:
Pay attention to the production date on the packaging box and do not use expired early pregnancy test strips.
Carefully read the instructions before self-testing and follow them meticulously.
Performing a self-test for early pregnancy at night may, to some extent, affect the accuracy, whereas using morning urine will yield a more accurate result.
Many early pregnancy test strips indicate that women can perform a self-test for early pregnancy after missing their normal menstrual period by 1-2 days. If the self-test result is negative and menstruation still does not occur after a week, a self-test should be conducted again.
If pregnancy is in its early stages or if there is ectopic pregnancy, such as tubal pregnancy, the tested urine should be allowed to stand for more than 3 minutes (usually only 1 minute is needed) to carefully identify any weak positivity, i.e., the color in the test area is lighter than that in the control area, or barely visible.
Pay attention to positive self-test results, such as blood in urine, endometrial hyperplasia, ovarian tumors, recent pregnancy, missed abortion, or incomplete abortion.
