Levels
In women, progesterone levels are relatively low during the preovulatory phase of the menstrual cycle, rise after ovulation, and are elevated during the luteal phase, as shown in diagram below. Progesterone levels tend to be < 2 ng/ml prior to ovulation, and > 5 ng/ml after ovulation. If pregnancy occurs, human chorionic gonadotropin is released maintaining the corpus leuteum allowing it to maintain levels of progesterone. At around 12 weeks the placenta begins to produce progesterone in place of the corpus leuteum, this process is named the luteal-placental shift. After the luteal-placental shift progesterone levels start to rise further and may reach 100-200 ng/ml at term. Whether a decrease in progesterone levels is critical for the initiation of labor has been argued and may be species-specific. After delivery of the placenta and during lactation, progesterone levels are very low.
Progesterone levels are relatively low in children and postmenopausal women. Adult males have levels similar to those in women during the follicular phase of the menstrual cycle.
| Person type | Reference range for blood test | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Lower limit | Upper limit | Unit | |
| Female - menstrual cycle | (see diagram below) | ||
| Female - postmenopausal | <0.2 | 1 | ng/mL |
| <0,6 | 3 | nmol/L | |
| Female on oral contraceptives | 0.34 | 0.92 | ng/mL |
| 1.1 | 2.9 | nmol/L | |
| Males ≥16 years | 0.27 | 0.9 | ng/mL |
| 0.86 | 2.9 | nmol/L | |
| Female or male 1–9 years | 0.1 | 4.1 or 4.5 | ng/mL |
| 0.3 | 13 | nmol/L | |
Read more about this topic: Progesterone
Famous quotes containing the word levels:
“Pushkin’s composition is first of all and above all a phenomenon of style, and it is from this flowered rim that I have surveyed its seep of Arcadian country, the serpentine gleam of its imported brooks, the miniature blizzards imprisoned in round crystal, and the many-hued levels of literary parody blending in the melting distance.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“The only inequalities that matter begin in the mind. It is not income levels but differences in mental equipment that keep people apart, breed feelings of inferiority.”
—Jacquetta Hawkes (b. 1910)
“The country is fed up with children and their problems. For the first time in history, the differences in outlook between people raising children and those who are not are beginning to assume some political significance. This difference is already a part of the conflicts in local school politics. It may spread to other levels of government. Society has less time for the concerns of those who raise the young or try to teach them.”
—Joseph Featherstone (20th century)