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As a lipidologist, I've reviewed thousands of labs. There are a few things to take into account when getting and viewing one's own labs:

1. Am I like the people in the reference population? As Gordo pointed out, endurance athletes may have results that are out of the normal distribution but not dysfunctional. They are functional within the context of the individual.

2. If something is out of range, always ask 'why?'. The results may be a secondary (or tertiary) result of some other abnormality. Low ferritin, may not be due to iron deficiency but due to iron transport abnormalities or iron sequestration.

3. Creatine is converted to creatinine. Creatine supplementation can increase serum creatinine levels. If you are concerned about kidney function, a cystatin-C can be a useful additional test.

4. Lab tests are a snapshot of the current physiological environment. When labs are done is extremely important. Also, lab result trends can be far more enlightening than individual results.

5. Low testosterone in endurance athletes can be due to various reasons, including Exercise-Hypogonadal Male Condition (EHMC). This article explains -pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ar…. One must take into account the full HPG axis in order to fully understand the cause of low testosterone.

Apr 13
at
1:11 PM
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