Your blood test report comes back with a row of numbers – sodium, potassium, chloride, bicarbonate, calcium, magnesium – and one or two of them are flagged. Or maybe nothing is flagged and you’re just trying to understand what these values mean. Either way, “electrolyte imbalance” is one of those terms that gets thrown around […]
You’ve just gotten your cholesterol results back. There are four or five numbers on the report, one or two are flagged, and your doctor either rushed through the explanation or told you to “watch your diet” without much detail. You’re left trying to figure out what these numbers actually mean – not just whether they’re […]
Your doctor ordered kidney function tests, or they came back as part of a routine panel and one number is flagged. You’re looking at creatinine, eGFR, BUN – and possibly urine protein – and trying to figure out what any of it means. Whether your kidneys are actually in trouble or whether this is the […]
You’ve had thyroid bloodwork done. Your TSH is elevated – say, 5.5 or 7.2 mIU/L – but your Free T4 is normal. Your doctor calls it “subclinical hypothyroidism” and either recommends treatment or monitoring, and you’re left trying to understand what exactly that means and whether you should be concerned. Subclinical hypothyroidism is one of […]
Hyperthyroidism is the opposite problem from hypothyroidism – instead of too little thyroid hormone, there’s too much. And while the symptoms sound like they might be harmless or even desirable (weight loss, lots of energy, fast metabolism), the reality is very different. An overactive thyroid puts chronic stress on the heart, depletes bone density, disrupts […]
Hypothyroidism is one of the most commonly diagnosed conditions in American medicine – and one of the most frequently misunderstood by the people who have it. The standard explanation goes: your thyroid is underactive, so you take a pill, and your levels go back to normal. Simple enough. Except it doesn’t always feel that simple. […]
Your thyroid panel came back and you have a handful of numbers in front of you – TSH, maybe Free T4, possibly Free T3, and sometimes antibodies. Your result might be in the normal range or just outside it, and you’re trying to figure out what the thyroid gland actually does, why these numbers matter, […]
The thyroid gland is one of the most consequential organs in the human body relative to its size. About the weight of a AA battery, this butterfly-shaped gland in the front of the neck produces hormones that regulate metabolism, heart rate, body temperature, brain function, bone metabolism, and reproductive health. When thyroid hormone levels drift […]
You’ve had bloodwork done and the report comes back labelled “liver function tests” or “liver panel.” There are six, seven, sometimes eight numbers on it – ALT, AST, ALP, GGT, bilirubin, albumin, total protein, and possibly prothrombin time. Some are flagged. Some aren’t. Your doctor may have said everything looks fine, or may have mentioned […]
Here’s the thing about hypertension that trips most people up: it almost never feels like anything. No pain, no pressure, no obvious signal that something is wrong. You can walk around with a systolic blood pressure of 160 mmHg for years and feel perfectly well – while your arteries are being gradually damaged, your heart […]