Testing for Hormone Imbalances: The Big Five

By Joan Haynes, ND

Use the following symptoms to determine which hormones may be unbalanced and need to be tested.

Testing – Descriptions and Costs

Because there is such an overlap between the symptoms of the different hormone imbalances, the testing takes the guess work out.

Sex Hormone and Adrenal Testing

These hormones can be measured in saliva, blood, or urine. For menstruating women, collection is best near day 20 of their cycle. (Day 1 is the first day of bleeding). For non-menstruating women, or men, it can be run any day of the month. We’ve been using salivary hormone testing in our practice for many years and have found it very clinically useful. Salivary testing measures the “free-fraction” of the hormones, not “total” hormone levels. The free-fraction is what is available to be used by the body. The salivary panel is best used when a patient is not taking hormone replacement therapy. Typically, we test estrogen, progesterone, testosterone and DHEA. The cost for this test is $140. This involves collecting morning saliva. If a patient is experiencing low or high cortisol symptoms, we can test adrenal function for $140. This involves collecting saliva 4 times throughout the day since cortisol levels have a wide variation during the day. It should be high in the morning and much lower at bedtime. Another option is 24-hour urine testing. This test is more expensive at $250 without adrenal testing and $280 with adrenal testing. We prefer this test if a patient already begun hormone replacement therapy or if they think they are likely to begin.

Thyroid Testing

Thyroid hormones are best measured through a blood test. If a person is experiencing fatigue and other thyroid symptoms, we usually order a thyroid panel – TSH ($26.50), Free T3 ($19), Free T4 ($17). Depending on an individual’s other symptoms, we may want to rule out other causes of fatigue such as iron and B-12 deficiency anemias with a simple Complete Blood Count
(CBC) ($17).

For More Information:

http://thyroid.about.com The best site I know of for thyroid information.
www.zrtlab.com The lab we use for salivary hormone testing.
www.meridianvalleylab.com The lab we use for 24 hour hormone testing.
www.adrenalfatigue.org A comprehensive site by Dr. James Wilson, ND, DC, PhD site for more information about adrenal function and adrenal fatigue.