Can at-home semi-quantitative pregnancy tests serve as a replacement for clinical follow-up of medical abortion? A US study.

BACKGROUND

Medical abortion in the United States requires clinic-based follow-up, representing additional time and cost to women and clinics. We studied a semi-quantitative home pregnancy test as a possible replacement for in-person follow-up.

STUDY DESIGN

Four hundred and ninety women participated in the clinical study and used a pregnancy test to determine baseline human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) on the day of mifepristone administration and follow-up hCG 1 week later. One hundred and eighty-nine other women completed a user comprehension survey. Accuracy, feasibility and acceptability of the test were assessed in both the clinical study and the survey.

RESULTS

The test identified the one ongoing pregnancy in the clinical study cohort. Sensitivity and specificity were calculated at 100.0% and 97.0%. The majority of participants in both the clinical study and the user comprehension survey found the test to be "very easy" or "easy" to use.

CONCLUSION

At-home follow-up with a semi-quantitative pregnancy test is feasible for service delivery in the United States.