Why do Prescription Hormones Often Request Bloodwork
RaenaWhen women begin to go through menopause, they sometimes need to be prescribed hormones. These hormones assist them in balancing out the chemicals within their bodies and their minds, allowing them to alleviate their menopausal symptoms. To acquire hormones, providers will request patients to get a wide range of bloodwork that needs to be completed, in order to understand the correct hormones that they need to be placed on. Some may ask “why do I need to have bloodwork done, in order to be prescribed hormones?” Well, we’re here to give you the reasoning behind this process!
Although doctors can get a pretty good idea of which hormones you will need through assessing your health history and the symptoms you have been undergoing, blood work and tests give physicians more detailed information about what exactly is going on within your body.
Blood tests are able to:
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Give a truly in-depth and detailed analysis of specific hormones within your body and the precise levels of them within your blood.
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These tests can give an accurate diagnosis of what is going on within your body.
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Blood work will allow physicians to get an honest understanding of the number of hormones that are stored within your body, understanding which prescribed treatment will work effectively and efficiently for your precise chemistry.
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Blood tests will help physicians to recognize which prescriptions are currently working for you and which medications are not, permitting them to change the prescription so that it will efficiently work for you and you only.
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Permit physicians to monitor how safe you are on the prescribed hormones that you are now taking.
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Allows for doctors to ensure that you are receiving the very best care from the hormones that you have been prescribed.
When women go into a doctor’s office to be prescribed hormones, physicians need to get a good understanding of whether the patient is perimenopausal, menopause, premature menopause, or if they are experiencing another, more serious, condition. The first blood test will allow physicians to understand and assess which hormone levels are higher or lower than expected, serving in the discovery of an accurate diagnosis for the women’s condition.
These blood tests will be able to accurately give an estimation for the main menopause hormones that are currently out of balance within your blood and the rest of your body. If the follicle-stimulating hormone, also known as FSH, and luteinizing hormones, known as LH, are high, then this may mean that the woman is perimenopausal or going through menopause. These blood tests will also be able to also look at major sex hormones, such as estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, and DHEA, which are extremely influential hormones for women who are going through menopause.
Once doctors are able to acquire this bloodwork and establish a baseline of the hormones that are within your body, they will be able to select the very best prescription hormones for you.
A few notes on bioidentical hormones:
-Some Bioidentical hormones are commercially available and some are available in compounded dosage forms. Compounded products are made at specialty pharmacies in doses that are customized for each client. The dosage can be individualized to a patient’s specific hormonal needs and can only be obtained by prescription from an M.D., D.O., or Naturopathic medical doctor.
-Over-the-counter or (OTC) Commercial preparations are available of Progesterone, DHEA, Melatonin, Pregnenolone, Estriol, and Estradiol.