Hormone Testing: Why your test results may not be telling you the whole story.

Time after time I hear stories of women who have sought help from their health care professional for hormonal symptoms, only to be brushed off as normal or blood tested and told that everything has come back “normal”. 

Unfortunately, blood testing can often miss a huge part of the picture! Don’t get me wrong, blood testing can be very useful, but if you are exhibiting symptoms like heavy or painful periods, PMS, sore or fibrocystic breasts, irregular periods, cystic acne, facial hair, hair thinning, or any other menstrual health issue you probably need to look at the bigger picture. 

What blood testing misses:

  • All of the Oestrogen! Bloodwork checks for Estradiol (or E2), whereas more in-depth testing, will look at E1; E2 and E3 and their metabolites. Metabolites are super important! They tell you where your oestrogen is going after you have finished with it. Are you favouring a certain pathway which is causing you symptoms? Does your phase 1 metabolism work but your phase 2 is slow and the drain is blocked?  These pathways don’t show up in blood testing, but you can find them in the urine. 

  • All of the testosterone! Again, are you favouring a pathway that increases your androgenic symptoms (cystic acne, hair loss, facial hair, PCOS). You will find these metabolites in the urine.  

  • What are your adrenal glands doing? Did you know they make sex hormones to? 

  • All of the cortisol! How much are you making throughout the day, where is going? what is it bound to? How is this affecting you?

As I said, blood tests aren’t useless, they just may not be telling you the whole picture. 

A huge frustration of mine is women being sent for blood testing for hormones and neither the health care practitioner or the woman have any idea what day of the cycle they were on. You MUST know the day of your cycle, or the whole test is pointless!

For example, we make our progesterone once we have ovulated, and this peaks around 7 days prior to our period. If you test progesterone on Day 6, it’s going to be low- as it should be! But you still haven’t learnt if you are ovulating, and that is the main event of the cycle!

If you are on the pill and have been recommended a blood hormone test (or any hormone test for the matter), please don’t bother. The OCP suppresses your HPO Axis, or our brain to ovary speak, so your oestrogen, progesterone and testosterone will all be low as your ovarian function has been switched off. 

What do I use in the clinic? 

I love DUTCH testing (dried urine test for comprehensive hormones), as it provides me with an extremely comprehensive picture of sex hormones and their metabolites, alongside adrenal function, melatonin and organic acid markers for important vitamins and enzymes. 

We can learn more about the drivers of the hormonal imbalance which leads to better treatment strategies and you get better sooner. 

So if you have been told your blood results show that everything is “normal”, you may want to dive a little deeper!  

If you would like to work with me and get your hormone health back on track, sign up for Well Balanced Woman Online Course, or the Well Balanced Woman Consultation Package which includes the DUCTH Test, Online Course and New Patient Consultation Package. 

Jody Walker