Home Pregnancy Testing

Home pregnancy testing is a great way for you to learn whether or not you are pregnant.  When performed by carefully following the instructions, home pregnancy tests are 97% accurate. 

There are many great reasons to consider home pregnancy testing 

• You want to know if you are pregnant or not right away
• You don’t want anyone else to know
• You have been trying for a while to get pregnant
• You know you are pregnant, but performing a test and seeing a positive result is still reassuring.
• You have irregular periods and you want to be sure a late period doesn’t mean you are pregnant

There are some downsides to home pregnancy testing

While we think that the pros vastly outweigh cons, there are some downsides to home pregnancy testing.

• Urine tests only tell you if the pregnancy hormone, hCG, is present, it doesn’t let you know if your hCG levels are rising as they should.
• You can get false negative results if you don’t follow the instructions exactly
• Sometimes you will only get a very faint line on your pregnancy test which leaves you wondering if you are truely pregnant or not

Home versus hospital testing

Many people assume that getting a pregnancy test in a medical setting is more accurate. That is not necessarily true.

For urine tests, they use the same test strips that you can get at your local pharmacy or online. Therefore, assuming you are following the instructions properly, you will get exactly the same results at home as at your doctor’s office.

Blood tests are a different story. A pregnancy test using your blood will tell your doctor not only if the pregnancy hormone is present (hCG) but also how much of it is present. Since hCG levels rise quickly and fairly predicably during early pregnancy, your doctor will be able to tell not only if you are pregnant or not but also how many weeks pregnant you are.

Additionally, if you know you are eight weeks pregnant, but your hCG levels are at the five week pregnant level, that may be an early indicator that you will miscarry or that you calculated your due date incorrectly.

The long and the short of it is that a blood test provides quantitative information that a home pregnancy test can't. For this reason, many women like to confirm their pregnancies with a doctor at some point early on.

  

What is the best way to do a home pregnancy test?

We feel that the best way to ensure you have accurate results when you perform a pregnancy test is as follows.

Note: Get an EARLY pregnancy test - if it is labeled early pregnancy it will be more sensitive and you are less likely to get a false negative or a faint line if you are testing close to conception.

• Perform the test first thing in the morning using your first urine of the day
• Collect the urine in a cup
• Collect urine mid stream (after you have been urinating for a few seconds)
• Insert the test strip into your collected urine for the precise number of seconds recommended by your test kit
• Wait the recommended amount of time before reading the results

We like this method best because we get the most accurate results.  

The concentration of hCG will be highest in the morning when you haven’t been drinking alot of water and the urine has been in your bladder for longer.  

We use a collection cup so that we can be certain that the test strip is saturated the exact right amount.  Too much urine and too little urine (like when you pee on the test strip) can result in inaccurate results. 

Our favorite over-the-counter home pregnancy test brands

Here are our favorite over-the-counter pregnancy test brands.  You can click on each to see descriptions and ratings on Amazon.com:

• Clear Blue
• Fact Plus
• First Response
• Equate

You can also read our review of the Fact Plus Pregnancy Test.

All of the above are known to be very accurate and also offer early pregnancy tests (most sensitive). However, they can get expensive if you are trying to get pregnant or want reassurance that you are pregnant.

For this reason, we searched around for online alternatives.

Read Our Pregnancy Test Reviews

• Clearblue Digital Pregnancy Test
• Accu-Clear Pregnancy Test
• Fact Plus Pregnancy Test
  

Our favorite online home pregnancy tests

We have been ordering and recommending both the conception test strips as well as the pregnancy test strips from www.early-pregnancy-testing.com for over ten years now with great results.  

They are MUCH cheaper than the over the counter strips above.  The last batch we purchased were $0.50 USD each!  

For women who are trying to get pregnant, they also offer a myriad of conception tools including our favorite, the Clear Blue Fertility Monitor.  

If you are trying to get pregnant, check our their Ovulation and Pregnancy Test Bundle as it is our favorite and the least expensive alternative we have been able to find. 

Other Great Home Pregnancy Tests

Read our review of the Fact Plus Pregnancy Test.

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