A great article on HRT......
This is one of the best articles I have ever read. It is long but contains a ton of good info. Thanks to Thrower74@MMI for the article!
You say you want some information about test therapy and it's benefits? You say you haven't found any articles or studies? Well bunky this is your lucky day. Boy did you come to the right place or what.
As men age past year 40, hormonal changes occur that perceptibly inhibit physical, sexual, and cognitive function. The outward appearance of a typical middle-age male shows increased abdominal fat and shrinkage of muscle mass, a hallmark effect of hormone imbalance. A loss of feeling of well being, sometimes manifesting as depression, is a common psychological complication of hormone imbalance.(94-97,271 )
Until recently, these changes were attributed to "growing old," and men were expected to accept the fact that their body was entering into a long degenerative process that would someday result in death.
A remarkable amount of data has been compiled that indicates that many of the diseases that middle-aged men begin experiencing, including depression, abdominal weight gain, prostate and heart disease are directly related to hormone imbalances that are correctable with currently available drug and nutrient therapies. To the patient's detriment, conventional doctors are increasingly prescribing drugs to treat depression, elevated cholesterol, angina and a host of other diseases that may be caused by an underlying hormone imbalance.
If doctors checked their male patient's blood levels of estrogen, testosterone, thyroid, and DHEA (instead of prescribing drugs to treat symptoms), they might be surprised to learn that many problems could be eliminated by adjusting hormone levels to fit the profile of a healthy 21-year- old.
Few physicians know what hormone blood tests to order for men, nor do they have the experience to properly adjust hormones to reverse the degenerative changes that begin in mid-life. This protocol will provide the patient and physician with the information necessary to safely modulate hormone levels for the purpose of preventing and treating many of the common diseases associated with growing older.
Too Much Estrogen
The most significant hormone imbalance in aging men is a decrease in free testosterone while estrogen levels remain the same or precipitously increase. Through a variety of mechanisms, as men grow older, they suffer from the dual effects of having too little testosterone and excess estrogen. The result is a testosterone/estrogen imbalance that directly causes many of the debilitating health problems associated with normal aging. (1-12,28)
One cause of hormone imbalance in men is that their testosterone is increasingly converted to estrogen. One report showed that estrogen levels of the average 54-year-old man is higher than those of the average 59-year-old women. (1,5,13-18, 48)
The reason that testosterone replacement therapy by itself does not work for many men is that exogenously administered testosterone may convert (aromatize) into even more estrogen, thus potentially worsening the hormone imbalance problem in aging males, i.e., too much estrogen and not enough free testosterone. While there are studies showing that testosterone replacement therapy does not increase estrogen beyond normal reference ranges, we are going to show later how the standard laboratory reference ranges do not adequately address the issue of estrogen overload. (4,8,9,17,22-25,27,29-32)
Estrogen is a necessary hormone for men, but too much causes a wide range of health problems. The most dangerous acute effect of excess estrogen and too little testosterone is an increased risk of heart attack or stroke. (39-43, 261-270) High levels of estrogen have been implicated as a cause of benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH) (35-44,46,47 ) and one mechanism by which nettle extract works is to block the binding of growth-stimulating estrogen to prostate cells .(42-44,48,49,50)
When there is too little testosterone present, estrogen attaches to testosterone cell receptor sites throughout the body and creates many problems in aging men. In youth, low amounts of estrogen are used to turn off the powerful cell-stimulating effects of testosterone. As estrogen levels increase with age, testosterone cell stimulation may be locked in the "off " position, thus reducing sexual arousal and sensation and causing the common loss of libido so common in aging men. (94,99,259)
High serum levels of estrogen also trick the brain into thinking that enough testosterone is being produced, thereby slowing down the natural production of testosterone. This happens when estrogen saturates testosterone receptors in the hypothalamus region of the brain. The saturated hypothalamus then stops sending out a hormone to the pituitary gland to stimulate secretion of luteinizing hormone, which the gonads require to produce testosterone. High estrogen can thus shut down the normal testicular production of testosterone. (1,54,271-276,277)
One further complication of excess estrogen is that it increases the body's production of sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG). (280) SHBG binds free testosterone in the blood and makes it unavailable to cell receptor sites. (51-52,55,56)
Based on the multiple deleterious effects of excess estrogen in men, aggressive actions should be taken to reduce estrogen to a safe range if a blood test reveals elevated levels. We will discuss the appropriate blood tests and steps that can be taken to lower estrogen levels later in this protocol.
The Critical Importance of Free Testosterone
Testosterone is much more than a sex hormone. There are testosterone receptor sites in cells throughout the body, most notably in the brain and heart. (60, 180) Youthful protein synthesis for maintaining muscle mass and bone formation requires testosterone. (59,61-74, 87-90,261-264,287) Testosterone improves oxygen uptake throughout the body, helps control blood sugar, (68,75-78-80) regulate cholesterol, (67,69,81) and maintain immune surveillance. (82,83) The body requires testosterone to maintain youthful cardiac output and neurological function. (58, 65 ) Testosterone is a critical hormone in the maintenance of healthy bone density, (59, 66,67,84-86 ) muscle mass, (65-67,87-90,287 ) and red blood cell production. (67,69,92,93,98)
Of critical concern to psychiatrists are studies showing that men suffering from depression have lower levels of testosterone than control subjects. (94-98 ) For some men, elevating free testosterone levels could prove to be an effective anti-depressant therapy. There is a basis for free testosterone levels being measured in men suffering from depression and replacement therapy initiated if free testosterone levels are low normal or below normal.
One of the most misunderstood hormones is testosterone. Body builders tarnished the reputation of testosterone by putting large amounts of synthetic testosterone drugs into their young bodies. Synthetic testosterone abuse can produce detrimental effects, but this has nothing to do with the benefits a man over age 40 can enjoy by properly restoring his natural testosterone to a youthful level.
Conventional doctors have not recommended testosterone replacement therapy because of an erroneous concern that testosterone causes prostate cancer. As we will later show, fear of prostate cancer is not a scientific reason to avoid testosterone modulation therapy.
Another concern skeptical doctors have about prescribing testosterone replacement therapy is that some poorly conducted studies showed it to be ineffective in the long-term treatment of aging. These studies indicate anti-aging benefits when testosterone is given, but the effects often wear off. What doctors fail to appreciate is that exogenously administered testosterone can convert to estrogen in the body. The higher estrogen levels may negate the benefits of the exogenously administered testosterone. The solution to the estrogen-overload problem is to block the conversion of testosterone to estrogen in the body. Numerous studies show that maintaining youthful levels of free testosterone can enable the aging man to restore strength, stamina, cognition, heart function, sexuality and their outlook on life, i.e., alleviate depression.(261-270)
