21 day progesterone

What is considered a good level to indicate ovulation on a 21 day test?
What is the normal level and how do you know if you have very low progesterone?

hi India!
From memory (and someone correct me if i'm wrong), I think anything over 10 suggests that O has happened.
CD21 never picked up O for me because I seem to O a bit later. CD24 has worked for me in the past.
Then progesterone should stay high to support a pregnancy, or it will go down before AF arrives.

I think mine was 12? And the OB said that result looks like I had JUST O'd..and according to my FF chart, I O'd on the 20th, so I'm guessing 12 was still a low amount.

Edit: woops, just checked my old chart.. FF said I O'd on day 21. So yeah.. I had just O'd when I got the test done.

They only do the test on day 21 if you know you ovulated on day 14....they need 7 days to accurately check your progesterone levels for ovulation.

If you did ovulate on day 14, and you have the blood test on day 21, the figure really needs to be higher than 20.

If its lower, chances are you ovulated later, and you should get a repeat test done in a few days :) HTH

I think AF had come by the time I saw the OB.. and he had told me to go for the test on day 21. And he compared the test result with my chart, and it all seemed to match up. hehe. I guess he didn't retest, coz my chart showed the temp rise etc that goes with progesterone, and I got AF 2wks later. It was actually my first cycle on Metformin, that's why we were testing.

Hi India,
A level above about 15 indicates that ovulation has occured though usually we want to see a level in excess of 20. If you are on clomid usually we want to see the levels around or above 40. (this will depend on your practitioners preference)
I will copy and paste a chart here and these are the Australian values. You will see the variation of normal is quite vast.
Just keep in mind that you need to count 7 days from ovulation before you do the test. Progesterone levels should peak 7 days before your next period.

Male adult: < 2 nmol/L
Female:
Follicular phase: < 2 nmol/L
Luteal phase: 5 - 90 nmol/L
Post-menopausal: < 2 nmol/L
Pregnancy:
1st trimester: 30 - 150 nmol/L.
2nd trimester: 50 - 460 nmol/L
3rd trimester: 170 - 800 nmol/L

I hope this helps. Good luck on your journey... :hug:

Can I just ask... if you can establish ovulation to then count 7 days before testing.. surely there's no need to test coz you already know you O'd 7 days ago??

That's a good question Liz. Usually the "21 day Progesterone Level" is done to establish weather your cycle is working optimally. You will see from the chart there is a great variation of normal levels. If progesterone levels are not high enough often pregnancy cannot be maintained - this often shows as a shortened LP (less than 12 days is often thought of as too short and may cause an issue with early pregnancy loss or "chemical pregnancies")
A level of above 20 is needed to show that ovulation occured. However, if a woman has been ttc for a while and consistently has levels around 20 she may be offered some help to increase hormonal levels and/or further testing. Progesterone levels are one of the ways to check that fertility is optimal. :hug:

Thanks so much for all your responses. I have a verylow level of 1.8 so have not ovulated. Doc wants to increase clomid and etformin for next cycle and try again.