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HPA Axis

HPA Axis

What do you make of a saliva test with a very low cortisol all the way through the day, and then a ratio of cortisol to DHEA-S of one, DHEA-S being twice the high end of the range?

Dr. Amy Nett: Okay, so if I’m understanding this Justine, and you might need to clarify if I’m not interpreting...

I can see it’s necessary to do a DUTCH test to see the abnormal cortisol metabolites, or to see the cortisol metabolites. But with the DHEA so high, what might this mean? I keep reading about DHEA being high with PCOS, but no one really elaborates about it. Can you? What’s the mechanism behind it? What does it then cause to happen? Is it something to really worry about or not? If so, how can it be lowered?

Dr. Amy Nett: Okay, so here we’re talking about a woman with high DHEA and you’re asking about DHEA and...

What is the way to figure out if sulfation is upregulated or downregulated?

Dr. Amy Nett: Okay. So I think what you’re talking about here is what we talked about this week was...

Just ran a DUTCH test on a 60-year-old postmenopausal female. She complains of sleep issues, hot flashes. Essentially, slightly elevated afternoon cortisol, low DHEA-S, elevated melatonin. She takes melatonin on and off but didn’t for a couple days before entering the test. Below-range progesterone, estrogen, metabolism. Thoughts?

Dr. Amy Nett: And so she’s been postmenopausal for about five to seven years, and then I’m guessing that the...

Chris mentions in the exposome unit on HPA axis dysfunction that if a patient is having low blood pressure to consider limiting high-potassium foods. To what extent do you think this is necessary? For example, would a medium banana and half an avocado in one day be too much? If the patient starts taking half to one teaspoon of sea salt in the morning, can they be a little more liberal with the potassium in the foods they’re eating? Lastly should the patient be monitoring blood pressure throughout the day? If so, how often and when?

Dr. Amy Nett: Yeah, so a lot of answers to each of these questions are going to depend to some...

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