Viduus
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Thought experiment for fun...
Are we wrong to recommend TRT for low testosterone? We jump to an exogenous solution instead of trying to fix the body first.
I heard a british researcher talking about “functional medicine” on an Advices radio podcast. He outlined a systematic way to work backwards from the testes to verify each step in the HPG axis. This has been rattling around my brain.
Would the following protocol be a better way to handle low test? Specifically thinking about people who are overweight or recently were since it tends to go hand in hand with higher estrogen.
Assuming estrogen is high:
1) Take an AI to bring estrogen levels down to low normal. Higher estrogen prevents the pituatary gland from producing LH. (Via gnrh reduction from the hypothalamus) Monitor if lowering estrogen causes the pituatary gland to start producing LH. If so, work on estrogen management and improving natural clearance. (Possibly Nolvedex would be better then an AI... not sure if you want it directly effecting the pituatary gland or not)
2) If that doesn’t work, introduce clomid to kickstart the pituatary gland to produce LH. If that works, might be screwed with your pituatary gland? Not sure there’s anything to do - trt time
3) Once you have your body producing LH, verify your natural test levels. If LH is in range but test is low, you probably have bad tested - trt time
The British researcher had a version working backwards from the testes using HCG to imatate LH but I imagine a fair number of us had low test because we over aramotize and had higher estrogen, therefore blocking the pituatary gland from wanting to produce LH in the first place. Might as well start there.
Then only do TRT if you prove out you have non or poor functioning testes or pituatary gland.
Just a thought....
Are we wrong to recommend TRT for low testosterone? We jump to an exogenous solution instead of trying to fix the body first.
I heard a british researcher talking about “functional medicine” on an Advices radio podcast. He outlined a systematic way to work backwards from the testes to verify each step in the HPG axis. This has been rattling around my brain.
Would the following protocol be a better way to handle low test? Specifically thinking about people who are overweight or recently were since it tends to go hand in hand with higher estrogen.
Assuming estrogen is high:
1) Take an AI to bring estrogen levels down to low normal. Higher estrogen prevents the pituatary gland from producing LH. (Via gnrh reduction from the hypothalamus) Monitor if lowering estrogen causes the pituatary gland to start producing LH. If so, work on estrogen management and improving natural clearance. (Possibly Nolvedex would be better then an AI... not sure if you want it directly effecting the pituatary gland or not)
2) If that doesn’t work, introduce clomid to kickstart the pituatary gland to produce LH. If that works, might be screwed with your pituatary gland? Not sure there’s anything to do - trt time
3) Once you have your body producing LH, verify your natural test levels. If LH is in range but test is low, you probably have bad tested - trt time
The British researcher had a version working backwards from the testes using HCG to imatate LH but I imagine a fair number of us had low test because we over aramotize and had higher estrogen, therefore blocking the pituatary gland from wanting to produce LH in the first place. Might as well start there.
Then only do TRT if you prove out you have non or poor functioning testes or pituatary gland.
Just a thought....
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