Avon Natural Fertility

Advanced testing may reveal hidden problems.  Keep searching for answers.

Advanced Hormone Testing

Hormone evaluation is crucial to your diagnosis and treatment plan.  What are hormones?  Hormones are messengers produced by the endocrine glands that travel through the blood stream to reach their target tissue (cells).  For example, after an egg is fertilized, progesterone is released from the ovary travels to the cells of the fertilized egg and tells the cells to grow.

During the menstrual cycle, ovarian hormones (progesterone and estrogen) and pituitary hormones (LH and FSH) rise and fall in a complex pattern throughout the monthly cycle.  The brain (hypothalamus and pituitary glands) interacts with and directs ovarian hormone production.  The only way to comprehensively evaluate the interplay of the complex hormone dance in cycling women is a multi-sample test of pituitary and ovarian hormones.  Routine conventional hormone testing of cycling women is a one sample blood test of estrogen, progesterone, FSH, and prolactin.  The end result is an inadequate method of evaluating the hormonal status of cycling women.  In addition, the conventional “normal ranges” for ovarian hormones are so broad and non specific, that virtually ALL women appear normal.  This is the reason many women who are clearly symptomatic and suffering from female hormone problems are often told the lab tests are normal and nothing is wrong.  If women are never tested properly, then causes for infertility are never found.  Often, when we perform these multi-sample tests, common hormone imbalances are detected and have found to be associated with infertility, polycystic ovarian syndrome, fibroids, premantrual syndrome, endometriosis, and ovarian cysts.

Also, routine blood tests only measure the protein-bound form of the hormone.  Protein bound hormones are inactive hormones.  Only the serum ‘free’ blood test can measure the physiologically active hormones.  These tests are not routinely done because they are very expensive.  

In our office, we do advanced hormone testing.  Our advanced hormone testing includes an 11 sample saliva test throughout the menstrual cycle.  This comprehensive test includes 11 samples of the ovarian and 5 samples of the pituitary hormones.  Hormones tested include 11 samples of estradiol, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA, and 5 samples of FSH, and LH.  The patient brings home the test kit and performs all the tests in the privacy of their own home.  Let me guess, you’ve never heard of a saliva test used for hormone evaluation?  Here’s the explanation.  Saliva tests are 10 times LESS EXPENSIVE than blood tests.  Saliva tests for the ‘free’ active form of the hormone and is far less expensive than serum ’free’ tests.  In the medical community, confusion still exists over the reliability of saliva testing.  Here’s the explanation.  You can’t compare active hormones (saliva) to inactive hormones (routine blood tests).  Can you compare apples to oranges?  No.  In other words, appropriate comparison studies between ‘free’ fraction hormones through blood and saliva showed both testing methods were accurate.  If you understand this, you understand more about hormone physiology that most doctors!!!

What we are finding in these tests?  We are finding hormonal imbalances that would never be revealed with conventional 1 sample testing.  

• Misdiagnosis of Premature Ovarian Failure (high FSH levels)

In a typical infertility evaluation, day 3 FSH (follicular stimulating hormone) blood test is performed.  If this test is elevated, some young women are told their egg quality is deteriorating and don?t have much time.  Depending on the severity of the levels, patients are told their options are artificial insemination, IVF, or egg donor.  From a 1 sample test, we feel this assumption is premature.  A one sample test produces insufficient information.  FSH peaks to a certain level to initiate a dominant follicle to mature.  Subsequently, the ovary will respond with a peak in estrogen production.  Our tests measure the amount of the FSH surge and the follicle response index (how the ovary responds to FSH stimulation).  A 1 sample test will not give you all this information.

• Blunted LH surge

Have you ever wondered why those ovulation kits never seem to work for you?  The test line is never as dark as the control line . . . We are finding blunted LH surges.  If your LH surge is blunted, you will not show a positive ovulation test.  Progesterone production is directly related to the amplitude of the LH surge.  Since pregnancy cannot be sustained without sufficient progesterone production, this is necessary information in any fertility work up.  A multi sample test will show the amplitude of the surge and how the corpeus luteum (part of the ovary that is responsible for progesterone production) responds to that surge.  Doesn?t it seem pretty important to measure LH accurately?  A one sample test will not give you this information.

• Luteal Phase Progesterone: Estradiol  ratio

The ideal ratio of luteal phase (2nd half of the cycle) progesterone to estradiol should be 20-30:1. A low ratio favors estrogen dominance.

Common Symptoms of Estrogen Dominance
 

Heavy bleeding during the menstral cycle

Clotting,cramping

Water retention, bloating

Breast tenderness, lumpiness, cystic breasts, enlarged breasts, fibrocystic breasts

Weight gain

Headaches, migraines

Emotional hypersensitivity

Depression, irritability, anxiety, anger, agitation

Decreased sexual response

Thyroid dysfunction (resembling hypothyroidism)

Cold hands and feet

Sweet cravings

Insomnia

Acne

Gall bladder dysfunction

 

Here’s the good news. All these functional hormonal imbalances can be balanced properly without drugs or surgery! We can help balance your hormones by addressing your nutritional deficiencies with our program.

“You can trace every sickness, every disease, and every ailment to a nutritional deficiency.”

- Dr. Linus Pauling, winner of 2 Nobel Prizes

What is nutrition?

Nutrition: n. (from dictionary.com)

“The process of nourishing or being nourished, especially the process by which a living organism assimilates food and uses it for growth and for replacement of tissues”

Let’s think about that. Using food for growth and replacement of tissues . . . sounds like a good approach to healing, doesn’t it? That is the premise for whole food nutritional supplementation. Whole food nutritional supplements are the only supplements used in our office. Vitamins in their natural state always exist as living complexes with specific synergistic co-factors, enzymes, phytonutrients, and organic mineral activators. A vitamin needs all its synergists to function. Whole food supplements contain all these synergistic cofactors. Not only are our high quality supplements derived from whole foods, they are grown organically and cold pressed.

“The assumption that human technology could improve on the wisdom of Nature has become a primary cause of disease in the modern world. We dissect food, take out the most glaringly obvious parts, attempt to recreate them in a laboratory, and label them as ‘active ingredients’. In fact, it is the symphony of nutrients working synergistically that provides the quantum healing power of whole foods.”

-September, 2002 issue of American Journal of Natural Medicine, Patrick Quillan, PhD.