Chris D. Meletis, N.D.
Even in the new millennium, with all its technology and broad dissemination and free flow of information, many busy clinicians are still performing the same diagnostic hormonal workups that have been conducted for decades. Frequently, a few specific datapoints are targeted, such as follicle stimulating hormone and luteinizing hormone (LH) or estradiol and progesterone. Yet, primary care practitioners have all been trained to realize that hormonal pathways are dependent upon homeostasis of other pathways to promote and sustain optimal health.1 Thus, it makes sense that examining the bigger hormonal picture, the “lay of the land,” so to speak, yields facts needed to maximize clinical outcomes.
The common practice of examining select and narrow hormonal indices is akin to looking at a few trees within a forest and making a judgment on the ecology of the entire forest. Until recently, affordable testing that provided a truly comprehensive look at a patient’s hormonal profile was not readily available. Yet, by applying mass spectrometry more broadly in the clinical sciences, a few laboratories in the United States are providing comprehensive and affordable hormonal profiles at a fraction of the cost of previously used methods.