Researchers have found a way to , according to a new study. This is the first time that the has been able to be identified, meaning that instead of having a five-week window in which doctors would guestimate that a baby would be born, that window could be drastically reduced and be more accurate as a result.

According to researchers from Stanford University School of Medicine, a way has been discovered to determine when a woman with a healthy pregnancy will . This means that the acceptable window of a baby being born three weeks before or two weeks after the due date is estimated will become obsolete, according to .

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The study, published in , states that a more precise two-week window will become available in the next few years that will let a woman know .

To determine when will commence, a simple blood test will be conducted as the woman gets close to the end of her pregnancy. If steroid levels begin to change, according to , it means that the shift has begun from pre-labor into the labor portion of the pregnancy. And as a result of the change, delivery will occur in the near future.

Currently, the way that a woman's due date is predicted is by the doctor asking when the last date of the woman's period was. While some women know this like clockwork, others may not remember or have irregular periods. This makes determining a due date an imperfect science, according to . This is why it is considered an acceptable date of delivery if a baby is born three weeks prior or two weeks after, the estimated due date.

To determine a smaller window in which delivery would occur, researchers followed 63 women during the last 100 days of their pregnancy, according to the . Blood samples were taken two to three times in that window and were analyzed for over 7,100 "metabolic, protein and single-cell immune features," according to Stanford Medicine News Center.

What researchers found was that in the weeks leading up to delivery, large increases in progesterone and cortisol were present, indicating a move from pre-delivery to the delivery phase of pregnancy, according to the study.

And more specifically, if the regulatory immune protein IL-1R4 was present, then the inflammatory molecule IL-33 is reduced. This reveals a shift in the chemistry is occurring, indicating the body is readying itself for delivery.

Researchers hope that over the next several years, they will be able to not only use this smaller window with accuracy but be able to fine-tune it further to have a more accurate window of delivery still. And not only will this help expecting women to be prepared for when delivery will occur, but doctors will also have a better indication of when babies are full-term to ensure they are healthy upon delivery.

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