It is important to understand the level of testosterone you need to be healthy. It may not be what is published by the lab.
Women have more testosterone in their blood than they do estradiol. Testosterone is or has been until recently, the “secret” female hormone. It has always been associated with men and considered the male hormone. There have been many stories written in our culture blaming testosterone for the reason that some men become angry and out of control. It is a fact that the most violent men do not have higher free T levels than docile men. Testosterone is not the cause of the difference between men and women. Both sexes have testosterone, and the difference is genetic differences and how society raises boys in a different way from how they raise girls.
Dr. Maupin contends that premenopausal women have three times the amount of testosterone in their bloodstream than they do estradiol. Testosterone gives both women and men libido, muscle mass, thick bones, Dr Maupin’s findings are that both sexes need testosterone throughout their lives, and it is not recognized by the medical community that women need testosterone as much as men throughout their lives. The resistance to viewing the needs of women for testosterone has led to many symptoms and diseases that can be treated with one and only one treatment: Testosterone replacement. Instead, women are told in doctors’ offices across the country, in fact the world, that they are lazy or crazy and that they cannot change their condition. They are offered hopelessness instead of comfort compassion and a very effective treatment for a group of symptoms that are currently either not treated or inadequately treated with antidepressants, anti-seizure medications and anti-anxiety drugs to numb them from their symptoms of aging and illness that they get when they turn 40 something. Dr. Maupin wants to spread the word about women’s need for testosterone and their need for hormone replacement after 40, including the hormone testosterone.
Maupin contends that in medical school, doctors are trained to use the value on a blood test to diagnose and treat patients. That becomes the goal for treatment instead of reviewing the symptoms with the patients and determining if the patient had her symptoms relieved. Sadly, the method of determining success of a treatment by achieving a certain blood lab result is faulty and should not be used in most cases for many reasons. First, blood tests are known for being wrong because of poor handling, inaccurate reference ranges based on a group of people the lab draws blood on instead of young and healthy patients, and because the labs “normal ranges” are really just an average for your age, and not a sign of health.
Dr Maupin’s contention and the focus of her practice at BioBalance Health® is to treat patients to alleviate symptoms of hormone deficiency based on young healthy blood concentration. Whatever symptoms brought you to BioBalance are identified and treated. The goal is to achieve resolution of symptoms, while using lab as the individual patient’s optimal blood level. Because Dr Maupin does not diagnose by using the lab’s average for your age numbers to diagnose and treat hormone deficiency, this sometimes causes her to hear negative comments from other physicians who focus on lab -based treatment even if the patient is not feeling better after treatment.
There is a research physician from Ohio, Dr Rebecca Glaser, who has studied testosterone pellets for hormone replacement in women and has come to the conclusion in her 2013 research article in the medical journal Maturitis (74;179). Her research states that every woman has a perfect blood level of Free Testosterone for her and the numbers do not dictate how well she feels but can be established as a goal for each individual woman on T pellets, because all women do not fit in a specific range. This is proven in Dr. Glaser’s research paper, “Testosterone implants in women: Pharmacological Dosing For Physiologic Effect.” Her name for testosterone deficiency is “ androgen deficiency”.
My hormone replacement practice specializing in testosterone pellets for both sexes, has lasted more than 18 years and I have been successful by treating my patients in accordance with their symptom relief, rather than by a standard lab reference range. My patients live longer and lead a symptom free healthy quality of life. They are not in pain, not weak, not unable to stand and walk, they feel sexual and mentally alert and good as they age. If you would like to experience these benefits, find a doctor who provides T for women, and talk to that doctor about symptom relief as an approach for treatment above and beyond the standard one size fits all policy of current medical practice.
Another example of treating patients based on symptom relief as a sign of optimal hormone replacement is Dr Maupin’s method of thyroid management. Many doctors under manage or fail to manage thyroid replacement by only looking at the blood test numbers instead of talking to their patients and asking which of their symptoms are gone. Currently most doctors base their treatment on what are called “normal” by the labs. But the lab companies don’t test young healthy men and women to determine the reference range, they just lump all the patients together and determine the median and design “normal ranges” from an old or sick population of patients.
In addition, Labs gather their data from the area in which you live from all the thyroid tests they test in the area, and then calculate and average or normal score. In our part of the country, there is a deficit of iodine in our diets. We do not get enough iodine. Our normal level based on our “average” score is low mathematically and our bodies are suffering from that deficit. Dr.’s Maupin and Sullivan at BioBalance Health try to focus on and treat your issues and symptoms and NOT just try to achieve a blood level that is average for a median blood level based on age adjusted cohort of sick individuals getting their blood drawn for other reasons.
The strong belief of the physicians at BioBalance Health is that you should feel better, and that you should not be suffering from the same symptoms that brought you to their office, after treatment is established. Healing is the concept of making you feel better and function better, but not just the act of reaching some arbitrary number on a lab test. We use lab to determine an individual’s optimal blood levels, those blood tests that are taken when the treatment is complete, and symptoms are gone!
This Health cast was written and presented by Dr. Kathy Maupin, M.D., Bio-identical Hormone Replacement Expert and Author, with Brett Newcomb, MA., LPC., Family Counselor, Presenter and Author. www.BioBalanceHealth.com.
