hCG or Human Chorionic Gonardotropin is a pregnancy hormone which will be present in the blood or urine of a pregnant woman. All the pregnancy test work by detecting this hormone called hCG. Mainly, there are two kinds of pregnancy tests. One for the hCG hormone in the urine and other for the hCG hormone in the blood. Blood tests are of two types:
- To check whether hCG hormone is present in the blood, which is called qualitative and
- To measure the level of hCG that is present in the blood, known as quantitative.
The blood test is same to other simple blood tests. A single tube of blood is drawn from the woman and sent to the laboratory for testing. Blood test may take a few hours to get the results,whereas, the urine test results will be ready in a few minutes.
Nowadays, there are facilities available to do these tests at home, which is called home pregnancy test (HPT). There are HPT kits available in medical store. It is easy and inexpensive to check pregnancy using these kits. There is nothing to worry about the accuracy of home pregnancy tests unless you do not use them properly. Proper use can only give accurate results.