Pregnancy Blood Test

 

You’ll want to know at the earliest possible moment whether or not you are pregnant, but which test works best for pregnancy, blood test or urine test?  Is one more accurate than the other?

One thing you know for sure when you are trying to get pregnant is that you want and need to know as early as possible when pregnancy occurs.  The sooner you know for sure, the sooner you can begin taking the best care of your body.  While you can use any one of the numerous over the counter pregnancy tests, a blood test detects pregnancy sooner.  Your doctor will need to accurately diagnose pregnancy for you to begin caring for you and the baby, and this is done by conducting either a blood test or urine test.  Many women wonder if one test is better at detecting pregnancy than the other.  Since they may not be aware of what doctors are looking for in the tests or how the tests are conducted, women don’t know if they should be asking their doctor questions about them.  Looking at the differences and similarities between the two tests may help to demystify the process.

Pregnancy Blood Test

A normal part of prenatal care is a blood test.  It is relatively painless, although a small prick or sharp sting may be felt initially.  After the test has been completed, there may be a slight bruising of the area of needle insertion, but rarely is any discomfort experienced.  There is some belief that blood tests are more reliable than any other pregnancy test; however, if conducted too early, it can provide a negative reading when the woman is actually pregnant.

Generally, blood tests are administered by a lab or clinic specializing in this area.  Your doctor will likely provide you with a form upon which he/she has indicated what the blood test will be searching for, and may actually request several vials of blood to be drawn.  This form will accompany you to the lab or clinic, where a phlebotomist draws the blood, usually from a vein in your arm, as prescribed by the doctor.  The blood will then be tested for different conditions.

Blood tests to determine pregnancy are not standard.  They are generally conducted if a problem is suspected, such as an ectopic pregnancy.  The main element a doctor will look for in the results of your initial blood test is the presence of the pregnancy hormone, called hCG.  Human chorionic gonadotropin, or hCG, is produced by the placenta of a pregnant woman within 10 days of fertilization; thereby definitively confirming a pregnant condition.  This hormone will begin to be secreted even as the egg is traveling through the fallopian tube on its way to the uterus.  The amount of the hormone may be slight at this point, but blood tests are generally sensitive enough to detect even minute amounts.  A second type of test will measure the amount of hCG present in the bloodstream; a high level could indicate a multiple pregnancy or other conditions not related to pregnancy. 

Your blood tells a great deal about the condition of your body.  It will assess the blood type you possess from the four different types:  Type A, Type B, Type AB and Type O.  It will also provide the doctor with information about a condition called the Rh factor, which will either be positive or negative.  This knowledge is extremely important for several reasons, all of which can pose a danger to the fetus. 

Additionally, your glucose, hemoglobin and iron levels will be measured through the pregnancy blood tests.  If any infections or sexually transmitted diseases are present, they will be detected through your blood.  Evidence of certain diseases will also be visible; diseases such as cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia and Tay-Sachs disease are just a few of the genetic disorders that could possibly have been passed on to you that have not manifested yet.  Another important revelation of a pregnancy blood test is whether or not you have immunity against Rubella by the presence of antibodies in your blood. 

The information provided through a simple blood test can be invaluable to your doctor in caring for you and your unborn baby.  Any conditions that appear to threaten the health of either of you can be identified and treated before any danger emerges.  However, doctors rarely request the blood test simply to confirm a pregnancy. (continued...)