I have read a few post on here and really enjoy them, for i too am over 35…40 and just don’t put on the muscle like the young fellows do. My question is about hrt, how do you test for testosterone, and what are the normal numbers.
I don’t seem to have any problem in the bedroom yet and that makes me real curious about the t-levels. Also, has any one tried the supplements that are suppose to help your own body increase t-levels…isa test etc…?
Thanks for the info
Bgrasn
BGrasn,
Search is your friend. There are several schools of thought on what is “normal” for a 40 year old guy. Personally, I agree with what KSMan has stated. You need to get many factors tested to ensure that you’re treating the right issue. I don’t remember all of the factors, so I will leave it to your searching skills to find the right articles in T-Nation. (I’m not trying to be a dick; I’m trying to give you some info while juggling my work at the office. 
)
Unfortunately, getting a blood test for “testosterone” and comparing the value you get to what is “normal” is a fairly useless way to think about how testosterone works. For one, there is the total serum level, the “bioavailable” level and the “free” level. And if that isn’t enough to complicate things, the “reference ranges” for those values don’t really tell us what is “normal” they just tell us what values are the most common in men who are having their testosterone checked.
Think about the implications of that for a while. “Normal” men have no reason to have their testosterone checked. It also includes guys from 18 to 90 years old. What it all boils down to is that the numbers don’t really tell you much about what is happening in your body. Your body tells you what is happening in your body. If you don’t have any of the symptoms from the ADAM test, then there really isn’t any reason to assume you have any sort of problem.
On the other hand, getting your blood tested now, will, indeed, tell you what is normal for you at your current age and that may be a very useful thing to know in ten or twenty years. Have your estradiol checked at the same time as testosterone and estradiol perform a dance and it the ratio of the two that will determine much about how you feel and function.
I tell all of my over 40 friends to get a complete blood hormone panel done, so if in a few years something “just isn’t right” you can pretty much convince your doctor into putting you back where you where, not where some useless “average” chart says you ought to be.
Yes, it costs a few bucks but if you drop from say 800 to 300 the doctor may not be able to put you on HRT at 300, unless you have previous blood work then most doctors will follow the results and not the averages. Good luck.
When you get your labs back there will be a “Reference Range” listed – that is what is considered “normal” by your lab.
So for example my lab is citing this Reference Range for Total Testosterone for my age (51):
241-827 ng/dL
Earlier in the year my lab did not sort by age and gave this number
255-1010 ng/dL
[quote]e-loo wrote:
When you get your labs back there will be a “Reference Range” listed – that is what is considered “normal” by your lab.
So for example my lab is citing this Reference Range for Total Testosterone for my age (51):
241-827 ng/dL
Earlier in the year my lab did not sort by age and gave this number
255-1010 ng/dL
[/quote]
This is the part of the equation I forgot, the difference in lab ranges. W/O reference to age, different labs have different ranges, and then some throw the “age” thing in too.
This is why after all I have been through I cannot stress enough for EVERY man to get his blood work tested “just because”. This is a perfect example of a guy that gets tested still at 900, a few years later comes in at 350, and the doctor would be hard pressed otherwise to give him HRT because he’s in “normal range”. I apologize for beating this “horse to death”, but If one guy on this site this information helps, I will know all the time and research I have invested wasn’t just for me.
If you are interested in increasing muscle size or LBM, and you get your panel of numbers (yes, panel, not just total T), then it would be interesting to see what taking herbal T boosters or “natural estrogen reducers” would do. Biotest has some, and there are many others on the market.
Your lab test could guide which herbal product to try, i.e. slightly below average T, try tribulus or Alpha Male, estradiol too high, try DIM or Rez-V. And then recheck the levels in question six months later.
Unfortunately, there haven’t been many anecdotal success stories in this section on this approach, but I’d personally be interested in your results. Doc
Doc, I’m interested in your take on DIM. I’ve read a number of articles at pubmed that say it is an androgen receptor antagonist. It’s easy to see how this could lead to a seemingly improved testosterone/estradiol ratio if DIM is making androgen receptors unavailable for testosterone. It seems like a good news/bad news deal. The good news is that you have more testosterone. The bad news is that it has no place to go.