The Five Most Useful Lab Tests for Measuring Your Health
As a new year approaches, it’s good idea to assess your health status and make informed decisions about what you need to do next to get your body in the best health ever.
While I feel that oft times, practitioners over-rely on lab testing and use it instead of applying clinical detective tools, like a good interview and exam, still there are many lab tests that I believe are super important to guide you to making informed decisions about what to eat, how to move, and what supplements might be needed.
The basic lab tests performed as part of the “annual physical”contain a tremendous amount of information about your nutritional status and your health…far more than most conventionally trained practitioners know to look for.
The Basic Lab Test: Understanding what “Normal” Means
The ranges used by most doctors are those calculated by the lab. Sadly, for most tests the way they decide if a value is normal or abnormal is based on the average values of all the lab tests done by that lab. So when you’re told you are “normal” what It really means is that you’re average.
I, for one, fail to feel encouraged to be told I’m average in a land where close to 50% of the people get cancer, autoimmune disease is epidemic, hormone imbalance is rampant, and heart disease and diabetes kill millions each year.
As a functional medicine practitioner, I look at optimal ranges calculated from studying healthy populations.
The List of Five Lab Tests that are Helpful Guides to Optimal Health
The following list is not meant to be comprehensive. Check with your doctor to determine the best tests for you.If you don’t have a primary care doctor or do but don’t have insurance coverage for lab tests, I suggest you check out one of the direct access labs that allow you to order your own blood tests.
The one I use is called Direct Labs – http://www.directlabs.com.
These panels are unfortunately only available in the continental U.S. excluding New York, New Jersey and Rhode Island due to state laws in these localities. If you live outside the U.S. or in one of these states, speak to your local health practitioner or seek a functional medicine doctor in your area to get help with ordering tests.
1. Comprehensive Wellness Profile (CWP)
I like to start with a comprehensive blood chemistry panel and Complete Blood Count (CBC). Direct Labs calls this the Comprehensive Wellness Profile, aka CWP. It’s a panel of over 50 tests that assesses your thyroid, kidneys, liver, cholesterol and other blood lipids (fats), minerals, fluids and electrolytes, and blood sugar.
The CWP also includes the aforementioned Complete Blood Count test, which assesses your immune system and determines if you have anemia and what kind of anemia if so.
Direct Labs usually runs a sale on this test in December. Until the end of the month, you can order this complete panel for only $59.
Click HERE for details.
Even if you’re outside the region that can Direct Labs to run the test for you, you can see what’s covered and be better informed when you speak to your local practitioner about ordering the equivalent for you.
2. Vitamin D
Next, I add Vitamin D.This is a very important test to run, as Vitamin D deficiency is very widespread due to the fear of the sun propagated by the media.Vitamin D is made by your body upon exposure to UV sunlight.Deficiency of Vitamin D can lead to widespread problems, including altered immune system function, including autoimmune disease, leaky gut, depression, hormone imbalance and much more.
3. Thyroid
If you’re tired, overweight, have dry skin, depression or constipation, your thyroid might be off.While the CWP tests thyroid, it’s not always enough.The most common cause of low thyroid function is an autoimmune condition.For this, I suggest you add to the mix 2 tests for thyroid antibodies: Thyroid Peroxidase and Antithyroglobulin.
4. Blood Sugar
If you have a history of blood sugar imbalance, hard to get rid of belly fat, fatigue, or a family history of diabetes, I also recommend additional tests to assess your blood sugar status and determine if you have a tendency towards insulin resistance or diabetes. The CWP includes fasting blood glucose, but often this is not enough to give the true blood sugar balance picture.
I recommend also running fasting insulin and hemoglobin a1C. In addition, you can purchase an inexpensive blood sugar meter at your local pharmacy or online and really get the complete picture.
5. Heart
Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S. Sadly, for about 50% of people with heart disease the first symptom is dropping dead of a heart attack. This happened to BOTH my parents. Wouldn’t you like to know if you are at risk BEFORE a fatal event so you can take the steps to reduce your risk?
If you have a family history of cardiovascular disease, or find that your cholesterol tends to be higher than ideal, there are a couple of really useful tests. C-Reeactive Protein (CRP-hs) is a marker of inflammation in your blood vessels and homocysteine is an amino acid that plays a role in destroying the lining of your artery walls, promoting the formation of blood clots, and also accelerates the buildup of scar tissue. High levels may increase the chance of heart disease and stroke, especially if you have other risk factors such as diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity, smoking, or family history.
I suggest you run CRP-hs and homocysteine tests if you feel you are at risk. There are also much more detailed and sophisticated cardiac risk tests, including one called VAP, that I order when appropriate.
Extra Tests
Extra tests I often run when indicted by symptoms and health history are the adrenal stress index and a fatty acid test to determine the balance between the oh-so-important omega 3 and 6 fats and risk for inflammatory disease.
How to Determine Which Tests You Need
When I’m working with someone one on one, I do a complete history and determine which tests would be helpful.
My Assess Your Own Body Chemistry class was designed to empower you to take charge of your own health. The program teaches you how to read your own lab work, as well as physical signs and symptoms.
We’ll be releasing the self-study version of the course in early 2012.It’s an excellent way to learn how to read your own body.
Finally, if you are overweight, crave sugar or carbs, and feel like you need to eat frequently to maintain your energy, you most likely have a blood sugar imbalance. In this case, I recommend you get yourself a glucose meter and start to track your response to foods.
The participants in my recent B4 Be Gone System learned how use a glucose meter to track their blood sugar in response to their foods and realized the tremendous value in knowing just how each food affected them. Knowing YOUR response to particular foods guides you in designing a diet that keeps your belly flat, your mind sharp and focused, and your energy high. The B4 Be Gone System will be available again for a live group setting in February 2012.
Before you get yourself tested, make a commitment to take good care of yourself. Get the white stuff out and the green stuff in.
If you’ve been feeling off or overweight in spite of a good diet, it’s time to do some testing and see what’s out of balance.
Measuring your health is the best way I know to really determine how your habits are serving you.
Watch here for more information and resources for lab testing over the next couple of months.
Tags: blood count, blood sugar, blood sugar imbalance, direct labs, heart disease, immune system, lab test, lab testing, thyroid, Vitamin D
Posted in Health Coach, Lab Testing, Vibrant Health
Thyroid Issues: What’s Really Leaving You Feeling Flabby, Foggy, and Fatigued!
- by Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo
Thyroid imbalance can leave you feeling flabby, foggy, fatigued and unfocused because your thyroid gland rules your metabolic rate.
Fatigue is a huge part of thyroid imbalance… and not just general fatigue either. Did you know that your organs and glands can suffer from fatigue? Your skin and immune system can too.
When you turn down the internal metabolic furnace and burn your fuel more slowly, the inevitable result is weight gain or the inability to easily shed your extra pounds. Generally, this slow-down is accompanied by a feeling of exhaustion, but not always.
Often the “exhaustion” is at a cellular level. When your skin is tired, you get outbreaks and slow wound healing. When your digestion becomes sluggish, you may experience constipation or indigestion. A fatigued immune system can’t adequately protect you from microbes and starts to attack itself. And a worn out liver is unlikely to be efficient at eliminating toxins.
While fatigue and exhaustion can have many causes, an underactive thyroid is a very common one. And what most people don’t realize is that most hypothyroidism (about 80%) is caused by an autoimmune process. Which, incidentally, means the real cause of your fatigue and weight gain has nothing to do with your thyroid. The thyroid gland is just an innocent bystander in the war that’s raging in your immune system, for it’s your immune system that creates antibodies that attack the thyroid and make it malfuntion. So simply replacing thyroid hormon without fixing your immune system does not solve the problem.
Learn all about thyroid function, testing, and a few tips to restore balance on my video here. It’s best to identify autoimmune thyroid problems early on, before your thyroid is completely destroyed. And the best way to do that is to balance your immune system. We’ll discuss that more in the new 5-part video series Bye-Bye Belly Fat, Brainfog, and Burnout, so be sure to sign-up and follow the series!
Join the program here:
Tags: belly fat, digestion, Exhaustion, fatigue, hormones, immune system balance, thyroid
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Brain Fog, Chronic Fatigue, Exhaustion, Fatigue Treatment, Hormone Imbalance, Reduce Belly Fat, Vibrant Health
Thyroid Health: Assessment and Care for Hasimoto’s Thyroiditis and Low Thyroid Function
Thyroid problems leave you feeling tired and unmotivated. Learn to assess yourself and balance your nutrition for better health. Jumpstart your energy with our free 7-day e-course!
http://www.JumpstartYourEnergy.com
Tags: autoimmune disease, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, Gluten Free Diet, Hashimoto's, hypothyroid, natural health, nutrition, thyroditis, thyroid
Posted in Chronic Fatigue, Exhaustion, Holistic Nutrition, Hormone Imbalance, Natural Hormone Support, Vibrant Health
Adrenal Fatigue: 3 Tips to Make Your Weekend Count
You’re not alone if you feel frazzled and exhausted by the end of the work week. While our fast paced age of technology has done wonders for keeping us connected like never before, it comes with a price.
Used to be you only got your adrenals fired up when tigers and lions were chasing you. As soon as the threat was handled, your adrenals would settle down and you’d return to a calmer and more steady pace.
When you’re at work, managing the tigers of deadlines, unhappy customers, unruly students and the abundance of stressors that frequent your day to day life, your nervous system operates from a state called sympathetic dominance. When you meditate, rest, do yoga and take time to “smell the roses” you operate from parasympathetic dominance.
Who cares?
You need to if you desire to be focused instead of foggy, energetic instead of exhausted and fit instead of fat.
You see, in sympathetic dominant mode, your digestion slows down, the valves between the various parts of your digestive tract tighten (leading to constipation and abdominal discomfort), and the high level thinking part of your brain, the prefrontal cortex, is inhibited, your hippocampus, gate keeper of your short term memory, gets damaged and DHEA, sometimes called the anti-aging hormone, decreases. The end result is you feel bloated, foggy headed and worn down.
In parasympethic dominant mode, the opposite happens. Your digestion becomes more efficient, your prefrontal cortex is enhanced, your hippocampus repairs and DHEA increases. As a result you feel calm, clear headed and focused and young.
By you may be wondering how to lengthen your stay in parasympathetic dominance.
Start by using my 3 tips to make your weekend count. They will put you into parasympathetic dominance and enable you to rejuvenate before starting the hectic pace all over again on Monday.
Make the weekend count by using it to regroup and give yourself the gift of self care.
1- Set aside 30 minutes for you! Go ahead and look at your calendar and schedule it in. And KEEP the appointment with yourself. Do something you love to do. Take a bath, lay in the sun, read a book…just do something that’s strictly for you. You’ll feel rejuvenated as a result.
2- Take time several times a day to express appreciation to someone, to yourself or to the universe for the blessings in your life. Studies have shown that 30 seconds of appreciation is the most effective means of restoring balance to your system. The Institute of Heartmath has performed dozens of studies on the benefits of appreciation.
3- Take some extra time to sweat. Yes, sweat. When researchers analyzed the sweat of participants after exercise, they found it loaded with toxins. Exerting to the point of a good sweat has many benefits with regards to cardiovascular health, hormone balance and detoxification. And surprisingly they found that the sweat after running for 30 minutes was more full of toxins than the sweat produced in a sauna. If you use your weekend to sweat away toxins, you’ll feel more focused and peaceful when you start the week again.
If you find yourself thinking, “I already know that” in response to the simplicity of these tips, ask yourself this: “Am I taking action?”
Many of the people I work with in group programs and individually are looking for the more glamorous solutions to their health challenges and fail to handle the underlying sympathetic dominance.
Sympathetic dominance is a real problem. No matter what herbs, supplements and foods you eat to support your tired adrenals, if you just keep forcing them to work hard, you won’t be able to restore them. And burned out adrenals can lead to thyroid issues, hormone imbalances, insulin resistance –which contributes to excess belly fat— and chronic fatigue.
I urge you to slow down and use the weekend to restore balance. Once you get that piece wired, we can talk about how to increase your parasympathetic dominance during the week.
To find out the impact of sympathetic dominance on your health, you can answer a set of questions, check physical signs, look at a few markers in routine blood work and even order specialized hormone tests.
In my new course, Assess Your Own Body Chemistry I teach how to evaluate for signs of nutritional deficiency and hormonal imbalance.
Love, Health and Gratitude,
Dr. Ritamarie
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, appreciation, chronic fatigue, detox, detoxification, digestion, digestive tract, Dr. Ritamarie, DrRitamarie, health challenges, heart math, HeartMath, hormonal imbalance, nutrition, self care, supplements, thyroid, tired
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Fatigue, Chronic Stress, Detox Program, Exhaustion, Fatigue Treatment
Overcoming Chronic Fatigue and Adrenal Exhaustion by Having Fun!
I work with lots of patients and clients who suffer from adrenal exhaustion, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, and thyroid problems. I learn a lot from them. One thing I’ve noticed is that they are too tired to have fun. Imagine not having enough time in your life for enjoyment? By the time they finish doing all the things they “have to” do, they need to rest, and are constantly turning down offers to go out for fun activities. Even though I don’t suffer from fatigue–in fact quite the opposite – I still sometimes fall into the trap of putting fun last.
I’ve learned a lot of lessons about this very topic this week. It started last Sunday when I had an unexpected day of unplanned connection and fun.
I realized that although I value having fun, I sometimes let it take the back burner to work and family oligations.
One of the tools I use when coaching both private and group coaching clients is a fun assessment. They are guided to list at least 20 things they love to do, and create a strategy for incorporating fun into each day. I haven’t done this myself in a long time, and I plan to do it this weekend. Because your interesets may change from time to time, it’s a good idea to revisit the activity regularly, or at least twice a year.
So schedule some time…at least a half an hour..to sit back, relax and make a list of all the things you love so much that you feel a calling to them. Then schedule as many days as you can (at least 4) to have scheduled fun time. Start with 5 minutes. It’s addicting and you’ll soon find yourself extending the time you’ve allotted.
Just do it. When you’re having fun, your biochemistry changes. You become more relaxed and your digestion improves. Your hormones are more balanced. Your neurotransmitters become more balanced and as a result your mood improves and your energy increases.
I’m planning to schedule at least 5 minutes of fun every day. My life and my health depend on it.
How about you? Will you join me? Post your reply in the comments section below.
Love, Health and FUN.
Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo
http://www.drritamarie.com
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, DrRitamarie, Exercise, Exhaustion, fatigue, fatigue symptoms, thyroid
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Exhaustion, Fatigue Treatment
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