The Blood Work thread
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Blood work. A great tool for diagnosis. I think it's important, given the extraordinary shyness of the average doctor, to have a basic knowledge of blood markers and their meanings.
If your weird dietary habits are backed by great blood works, you have skin in the game and everybody in the orthorexic world respects you.
In France you can ask a lab to do them without a prescription. For the items listed below it should cost about 150€. I don't know about other countries.
The list
(Secondary markers are in italics)
Blood glucose :
- HbA1c
- Fasting insuline
- Glycemia -- ideally 90mg/dL [https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-08498-6]
Thyroid :
- TSH -- ideally about 1.0 or under (although you can still be hypothyroidic with a normal TSH)
- PTH
- T3
- T4
- Reverse T3 (inactive T3)
Testosterone:
- Blood testosterone -- should be more than 500
- Free testosterone -- should be high
- SHBG (Sex Hormone Binding Globuline)
Kidney :
- Creatinine
- BUN (Blood Urea Nitrogen) -- BUN:creatinine ratio should be low
Electrolytes (ionogramme sanguin en français) :
- Sodium
- Potassium -- if low, might indicate poor kidney function
- Calcium
- Magnesium
- Chloride
- Bicarbonate (CO2) -- indicator of dysfunction in the kidney or lung
Liver:
- Gamma Glutamyl Transferase (GGT)
- Bilirubin
- Albumin
- Alkaline phosphatase (ALP)
- Aspartate amino transferase (AST)
- Alanine amino transferase (ALT)
Vitamins :
- Vitamin D(-25)
- Homocystein -- good marker of vitamin B12 levels and inflammation
Lipids :
- LDL -- likely a poor predictor of cardiovascular health if you aren't PUFA-filled
- VLDL
- HDL-C
- HDL-P
- Total cholesterol
- Triglycerides -- triglycerides:HDL-C ratio is an indicator of insulin sensiblity (lower is better)
Hormones :
- Cortisol -- unsure, as it may not even be a reliable marker [https://doi.org/10.1210/jc.2002-020048]
- DHEAS -- good adrenal gland indicator -- cortisol:DHEAS ratio is a good stress indicator, should ideally be under 0.3 [https://doi.org/10.1530/EJE-10-0299]
- Prolactin -- good general inflammation marker
- LH -- should be low
- FSH -- should be low
- DHT
- Estradiol
Iron :
- Ferritin
- Iron saturation
Inflammation and allergies :
- C-Reactive Protein (CRP) -- good general marker of inflammation [https://doi.org/10.1074/jbc.R400025200]
- IgA antibodies -- if elevated, means you might have problem with gluten or casein
- IgE antibodies -- if elevated, means you might have problem with casein
What should I add to the list ?
Also if somebody has Chris Masterjohn's substack, maybe they could give us some information on the actual appropriate ranges for various vitamins and hormones: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/nutrient-targets
