Sugar Pregnancy Test – How Does It Work?

Many home tricks and techniques exist that can help you know whether you are pregnant or not. There’s one using a shampoo, and then there’s one more that employs a sugar urine pregnancy test. These tests can be conducted at home with minimal preparation. Most of the time, such tests are meant to have only a preliminary idea of the condition, based on your own judgement and understanding of whether there is a chance of you being pregnant or not.

What is Pregnancy Test with Sugar?

Testing for pregnancy using sugar is by making use of simple sugar crystals and your urine. As with many other tests, it relies on the presence of the hCG hormone, known as human chorionic gonadotropin. It is generated by the placenta and the presence of it is known as a conclusive sign of being pregnant.

What Will You Need for a Home Pregnancy Test with Sugar?

To perform the test, you need only three items.

• Simple white sugar that does not have any impurities
• A clean bowl that is sterilized and dry
• Your first urine of the day

How to Perform This Test?

The test works best with the first early morning urine since it has the most chances of having a higher proportion of hCG hormone in it. To perform the test –

1. Add a few spoons of sugar to a sterilized bowl.
2. Take another bowl and collect your first-morning urine in it.
3. Pour some urine into the bowl with the sugar.
4. Observe the sugar crystals and see how they react with your urine.
5. Let it stay for a few minutes before jumping to a conclusion.

How does Home Pregnancy Test using Sugar Work?

The most important property that sugar has is its solubility. And that’s the principle based on which the pregnancy test works as well. When a woman is pregnant, her urine contains a good amount of the human chorionic gonadotropin hormone or hCG. When such urine comes in contact with the sugar, the hCG hormone reacts with the sugar, preventing it from being assimilated into the fluid of the urine. Therefore, the sugar will fail to dissolve and will form clumps instead. It is highly necessary to use fresh sugar for the test, and not old sugar.

How to Interpret the Results of the Test?

The results of the sugar pregnancy tests depend on the reaction the sugar has with the urine and whether or not the sugar is visible in the bowl after the reaction. The test can either be positive or negative.

1. Positive Sugar Pregnancy Test

On adding urine to the sugar in the bowl, if at the end of the sugar pregnancy test, the sugar stays at the bottom, in the form of clumps, then there is a good chance that you are pregnant. This scenario is termed as a positive sugar pregnancy test. Often the clumps form within five minutes of coming into contact with the urine.

2. Negative Sugar Pregnancy Test

If, on coming in contact with your urine, the sugar dissolves within no time, which indicates that your urine does not contain the hCG hormone to prevent the sugar from dissolving. Hence, it is a sign that you are not pregnant and such a scenario is termed as a negative sugar pregnancy test.

What is the Best Time to Do Sugar Test for Pregnancy Confirmation?

When it comes to a pregnancy test, be it homemade or by using a pregnancy test kit, everything depends on the possibility of detecting the presence of hCG in your urine. hCG is the first and foremost sign that can confirm the pregnancy in a woman and that’s all that matters in the initial stages.

Throughout the day, the urine can get contaminated or diluted with many other constituents, leading to a quantity of hCG in it, that may not be detected easily. Therefore, the best time to carry out the test is early in the morning, with a fresh sample of the first urine of the day. This has the highest chance of having hCG hormones in it, which can then be detected by the sugar. This would lead to the creation of sugar lumps and a clear result would be right in front of you, confirming your pregnancy.

How Accurate is the Pregnancy Test with Sugar?

As with any homemade pregnancy tests, there is no benchmark or rulebook that states the generalized accuracy level for it. Most tests are quite dependent on the environmental factors, the constituents used, the hygiene levels, the presence of impurities, the time of tests, and so on.

There might be chances of the bowl not being completely clean and sterile, with impurities in it, that could drastically affect the test. If the urine is not the first fresh urine of the day, the result could vary by a large degree, causing the sugar to dissolve easily, giving you a false negative pregnancy test result. The sugar that is being used needs to be fresh and should have been stored properly in an airtight container. Any sugar that is not stored properly or is quite old, can be extra sensitive and hygroscopic in nature. This would cause it to form lumps even before it has a chance to interact with the urine. In such a case, the visibility of lumps might prevent it from dissolving in the urine, causing you to believe that you are pregnant when, in fact, it is a false positive pregnancy test result.

Therefore, it is highly recommended that a homemade pregnancy test is reconfirmed using a professional kit after a few days, irrespective of whether you are expecting the same result or a different one.

Homemade pregnancy tests are a quick and inexpensive way to address the question in your mind related to your pregnancy. Most of the tests are fine since they do not make use of any toxic substances. However, they do not have a medical approval since they depend on multiple factors. Therefore, complementing these tests with a clinically-proven pregnancy test kit is your best bet.

Another factor to keep in mind is the understanding of your own body and whether or not you are expecting to get pregnant. Mostly, homemade pregnancy tests are conducted when you end up missing your period. However, there might be a chance that your periods are simply delayed due to stress and other factors in your life. On the other hand, if you are consciously trying your best to get pregnant and would like to keep checking for the results every couple of days, you can opt for these homemade pregnancy tests or instead go for affordable hCG strips. These are quite inexpensive compared to the usual pregnancy kits and have quite a good accuracy rate, too.

In any respect, the possibility of sugar clumping cannot be contested with the results of a pregnancy kit. Therefore, it is best to keep them only as a preliminary orientation and go for a conclusive one after a few days.