• American Metabolic Laboratories may be the only laboratory performing QUANTITATIVE HCG URINE TESTING (HCG-U).
• This test has the analytical detection level of 0.4 mlU/mL, same as the HCG-IMM blood test.
• The inclusion of HCG-U will eliminate the possibility of a false positive caused by a non-specific heterophile serum test reaction.
• The HCG Urine may further confirm the results of the HCG IRMA & HCG IMM.
• A negative HCG-U is indicative of a false positive of either of the two blood HCG tests (IRMA & IMM).
• A positive HCG-U test is deemed essential and confirmatory criterion of the biological reality of the true presence of the hormone.
• A positive HCG-IRMA and positive HCG-U may strongly suggest the reality of a developing or existing tumor. However, the IMM test enumerates the amount of total, and all other molecular forms of HCG in the blood, including tumor generated intact, beta and beta fragments, and pituitary HCG-L species. Therefore, it is strongly advisable to perform all three HCG tests.
• HCG only in the urine of females and males may be present as a result of age promoted developing or existing gonadal insufficiency. Generally, postmenopausal women and aging men experience a reduced or even seized production of estradiol, progesterone, or testosterone respectively. The immediate biochemical response is the production of large quantities of lutenizing hormone (LH) and follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) in both genders to stimulate the gonads to produce the sex hormones. In this pituitary rush the aberrant HCG-Like (HCG-L) hormone is produced, in rather small quantities. This molecular hormone species could be present in the urine of such individuals. The reason why it may show up in the first morning urine and not in the blood is that the minute quantities produced over night are collected in several hours of time in relatively small volume of urine as compared to several liters of blood. Thus in the blood, the HCG/HCG-L becomes diluted to beyond measurable amounts. Even though the HCG-L species are not tumor generated, it has HCG hormonal activity estimated to be approximately one-half of the tumor or the pregnancy hormone. In order to eliminate the production of the aberrant HCG-L, hormone replacement therapy, e.g. prometrium has been recommended. An elevated FSH level will indicate a good probability of HCG-L pituitary sysnthesis.
• For HCG test result interpretation, experts recommend a positive agreement of two different testing methodologies. American Metabolic Laboratories are simultaneously performing three HCG tests: HCG-IRMA (immunoradimetric assay), HCG-IMM (chemiluminescence assay), and HCG-Urine (chemiluminescence assay).
• Normal Value is less than 1.1 mIU/mL. Gray zone is 1.1 - 3.8 mIU/mL.

Values obtained with different assay methods should not be used interchangeably.