If you reach the age of 80 there is a 50% chance that you will have dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. That number is staggering and can be significantly reduced if patients had a road map on what they can do to reduce their odds. The purpose of this blog is not to bore you with details or physiology but to give you the basic steps you need to take. 1. Optimize Hormone levels: Estradiol (estrogen): there are hundreds of published medical studies linking estradiol levels to memory and cognitive decline. One of them most important studies
Did you know that 50% of patients who suffer heart attacks have normal EKG’s. normal cholesterol values and no symptoms prior to having a heart attack? The reason why that should scare you is because other than these basic screening tools very few physicians are ordering advanced tests to predict the likelihood of having a heart attack or stroke. The purpose of this blog is to educate you about what other options you have to screen for cardiovascular disease. Specifically the carotid ultrasound to look for thickness of the wall (intima media thickness) and for early plaque build up.
Higher testosterone levels in men reduce their risk of dying from all causes by 25-30% according to a study the journal Circulation (2007 ;116:2694-2701). They concluded “In men, endogenous testosterone concentrations are inversely related to mortality due to all causes, cardiovascular causes and cancer, with a 25%-30% lower risk in total mortality in the highest compared with the lowest quartile of testosterone level.” They discuss that the benefits of testosterone are the following in reducing risk of death: Improving HDL Cholesterol Lowering triglycerides Improving body mass index (decrease fat, increase in muscle) Reduced risk of diabetes Lower LDL
Many physicians that prescribe testosterone use an “estrogen blocker” (arimidex or chrysin) to reduce the peripheral conversion of testosterone into the hormone estrogen. They do this because they claim high levels of estrogen in men can adversely affect the prostate gland. What they fail to realize is that estrogen in men plays a critical role in preventing bone loss, preventing Alzheimer’s disease and dementia and also reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease. There is not one human study that shows estrogen in men is harmful. To the contrary I can produce 50 studies showing estrogens protective effects on
Time and time again I here patients tell me that they had their testosterone levels (or any hormone level) checked and their doctor told them they were “normal”. Despite the fact that the patient is symptomatic (decreased energy, sex drive and libido) they leave without treatment thinking that they are “just getting old” because that is what their doctors tell them. The point of this blog is to let you know that “normal” is not optimal and that the majority of doctors miss this point. In addition, because the patients labs are “normal” they do not get treated.
