switched from reg doctor to private clinic for my TRT

A

animal-inside

Well-known member
Trusted Member
Been about 6 or 7 years going through Regular doctor for TRT. I was reffered to a endo at the unviserity during this time as well.

All said and done, my reg doctor had me on
5mg statin
150 T4 (synthroid)- his idea was keep my TSH under 1.0. It seemed to help a lot for me with fighting my age (early 40's) related issues etc.
100mg test cyp a week. He wanted me to do 1 shot a week, but my estorgen went slightly high and i switched to 3x a week and my estrogen went right down.
100mg DHEA every day.

He also agreed with me taking
5mg creatine a day
follow a keto diet or very low carb diet.

this was my protocol for last 4 years and truthfully I felt very good, lost lots of body fat etc. My only issues were fasting blood sugar and higher bad cholesterol (but my good cholersterol and triglcyerides were amazing so he said I'm good).

Around this time my ALT was above acceptable range. I was sent for ultra sound on liver to rule out fatty liver desease, that came back negative but they discovered a few masses on my kidney's. The doctor didn't seem to be worried about these and said every 6 months they would check them and if they got to big (he gave a specific size) they would take them out.

My doctor moved and no other doctor would prescribe DHEA... I tried hard to find one who woudl since I notice cognitive abiliities decline without it. So I went to a private clinic.


All my experience with the private clinic was over the phone/email.

They sent me extensive blood work which I Did in town here. I didn't get it all done since 1) The nurse didn't take blood for my testerone blood work (this is the 2nd time they forgot to do it in the past 2 years when the requistion stated to do it) and 2) The local lab is not able ot perform all the blood work since they didnt have a special centrifuge.

Anyways I has a 45 min phone consultation with a lady who was clearly not a doctor, clearly did not read my medical history that I typed out and emailed to her.. but I was told

1) I need to inject once a week and take aridmex with the injection. .100mg test a week and 1mg arimidex with it. My estridol was 130, so not over range..

2) They blamed my liver issues on my creatine use.. I agreed to stop taking it for 8 weeks and retest my liver. I asked if it was more likely my statin use and they said no, more likely creatine. I disgreed, but I agreed to keep taking the statin and drop the creatine to rule the creatrine the culprit.. I feel that even if my liver values do not go down, they will tell me that the creatine permenatnly damaged my liver and it's still the creatine not the statin. THe lady (not a doc or Nurse) told me her husband has liver issues and although nothign was provoen, they are both certain it was his creatine use 20 years ago and his liver blood work still comes back bad even though hee stopped creatine 10 years ago..

3) They want my DHEA level to be around 11-14.. Mine was 4.2.. THey prescribed me 25mg DHEA a day.. I told them "my old doctor had me on 100mg a day and that only ever got me around 11 so I don;t think 25mg will do it". They insisted this wasn't the case and they would never prescribe 100mg to anyone. I agreed to their protoccal and retest in 8 weeks.

4) They want me to up my vitamin D from 2000iu's a day to 5000iu's..

5) They want me taking oral B12 1000 iu's a day.. my B12 tested at 498 and they said ideal is over 500.. I'm injecting B12 now, not doing oral.



They did not seem interested in my diet, cardio, supplements etc.. My local doctor would talk to me more about diet changes, blood work changes due to diet/cardio etc.. I also feel like the privite clinic didn't look at my medicial history or have ever seen me.. I could be a 300lbs lard ass who needs to learn to diet/exercise and they would never know.. my local doctor truly helped me understand and motiviate me to work on my cardio to impvore my blood work and over all health.


Either way...
I did a full100mg shot last Saturday and took the 1mg estrogen with it... I did not feel a "low" as the days went by and I am now on last day before my next injection.. I can't say I notive anythign different with the anti e..

I started 25mg DHEA today.. I had to get another pharmaxy to make it and mail it to my local pharmacy.
 
@gondar1 lol whats with the sad face?

It doesnt' seem like the private clinic provided very good care, but there was positives in it.. I think I will end up conitnuing through a private clinic, but if I don't actualyl speak to and go over my next blood work with the actual doctor who runs the clinic, I will just switch to a different private clinic.

Another reason I went private clinic is we have no doctors in town anymore. We have a huge shortage in our area to the point that emergency rooms are closing periodicially due to no actual doctor to man it. The closures are happening in my town and the two towns beside me. So it takes WEEKS to get a doctor appointmnt to get blood requisition paper and then weeks to have it reviewed.. I was annoyed with the waiting.. And the few doctors we have here are not taking new patients.. THey will see you, but they will not add you to their list of patients they see regualrly or monitor your overall health and invest time into you. So when I go back to review my next ultra sound of my kidney, it will be with a new doctor (3rd one now) who hasn't seen my previous ultrasounds. Bottom line is, I just wanted consistency in the doctor reviewing my blood work for TRT
 
animal-inside said:
@gondar1 lol whats with the sad face?

It doesnt' seem like the private clinic provided very good care, but there was positives in it.. I think I will end up conitnuing through a private clinic, but if I don't actualyl speak to and go over my next blood work with the actual doctor who runs the clinic, I will just switch to a different private clinic.

Another reason I went private clinic is we have no doctors in town anymore. We have a huge shortage in our area to the point that emergency rooms are closing periodicially due to no actual doctor to man it. The closures are happening in my town and the two towns beside me. So it takes WEEKS to get a doctor appointmnt to get blood requisition paper and then weeks to have it reviewed.. I was annoyed with the waiting.. And the few doctors we have here are not taking new patients.. THey will see you, but they will not add you to their list of patients they see regualrly or monitor your overall health and invest time into you. So when I go back to review my next ultra sound of my kidney, it will be with a new doctor (3rd one now) who hasn't seen my previous ultrasounds. Bottom line is, I just wanted consistency in the doctor reviewing my blood work for TRT
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Risky emoji use on my part :) easy to see many possible meanings sorry.

Your post left me with more negative than positive feelings about the care you are getting, the advice you are receiving and the unnecessary pain you and others often need to go through during this process.
I realize how by comparison to so many of the experiences I hear about that I was relatively lucky with how my journey through the process went.
 
I would shop around if you're not happy man. My trt doc is pretty good, 100 test 1 mg adex is dogshit. I'm on 170 test 80 d.h.e.a. a.i. is completely up to me, and I'd prefer even higher test so I add abit more and cut it back close to blood work time.
Regular doc's are useless besides saving your life in an emergency in my mind.
Try nac milk thistle or tudca for liver.
But yea find an online trt doc who knows how to take care of you if there's no doctors around.
 
Kevinbigdiesel said:
I would shop around if you're not happy man. My trt doc is pretty good, 100 test 1 mg adex is dogshit. I'm on 170 test 80 d.h.e.a. a.i. is completely up to me, and I'd prefer even higher test so I add abit more and cut it back close to blood work time.
Regular doc's are useless besides saving your life in an emergency in my mind.
Try nac milk thistle or tudca for liver.
But yea find an online trt doc who knows how to take care of you if there's no doctors around.
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who do you go through?
 
Trubalance but he isn't accepting patients. They got multiple locations I believe so maybe another doc with them will take you idk. they started me at 100 also and have just incrementally increased over a few years so real conservative but I've just been patient. Would of started at 200 if I had any say, but that's Canada it seems.
 
Kevinbigdiesel said:
Trubalance but he isn't accepting patients. They got multiple locations I believe so maybe another doc with them will take you idk. they started me at 100 also and have just incrementally increased over a few years so real conservative but I've just been patient. Would of started at 200 if I had any say, but that's Canada it seems.
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I'm getting blood work tomorow and going through True Balance out of Sheerwood Park, they are taking clients.
 
Kevinbigdiesel said:
Trubalance but he isn't accepting patients. They got multiple locations I believe so maybe another doc with them will take you idk. they started me at 100 also and have just incrementally increased over a few years so real conservative but I've just been patient. Would of started at 200 if I had any say, but that's Canada it seems.
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The clinic I jsut started with is trubalance, in Alberta. My wife has gone through them as well. She's happy and I feel like she got very good care, but she talked to the actual doctor several times, I've only talked to a lady with zero actual medical edcuation for 45 mins and the nurse to confirm my scripts for 5 mins.
 
animal-inside said:
What symptoms were you getting?
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My stomach just felt blah, like I needed some probiotics. Poop multiple times some days. But in smaller amounts because my stomach felt gross.
Actually I stopped all vits for a bit and my stomach felt way better, then I added things back in one at a time till I figured out what was doing it.

I have no issues with 1000 iu daily.
 
Sorbate said:
My stomach just felt blah, like I needed some probiotics. Poop multiple times some days. But in smaller amounts because my stomach felt gross.
Actually I stopped all vits for a bit and my stomach felt way better, then I added things back in one at a time till I figured out what was doing it.

I have no issues with 1000 iu daily.
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Interesting...
My wife can't handle a lot of vitamins without food or she gets neasua...

I don't think I've had sides from going from 2000 to 5000 IU's D..
 
It does sound like issues from the statin, side effects being liver issues, blood sugar and diabetes risk and neurological issues. They do advise switching to other statins also if it hurts your liver but I wonder if these meds could be cycled too. 6 months on 6 months off say or a hard 2 years on then stop for a few years. It seems silly to have to eat healthy take supplements and exercise but still need a medication. I like the idea of using it to reverse arterial plaque then after substantial amount of time maybe not needing it anymore and eating clean etc for a while..
 
animal-inside said:
Interesting...
My wife can't handle a lot of vitamins without food or she gets neasua...

I don't think I've had sides from going from 2000 to 5000 IU's D..
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I always take it with food. My wife is the same.

Mind you I think my gut is sensitive since the colon resection. I got some more gh started to take it and got gut issues, gave a kit to a friend and he had zero issues, so it wasn’t the gh.
 
Your experience at TrueBalance is the same as mine and a few other guys I know. Didn’t seem interested in my history and just wanted to give me a script. The consultant was also misinformed about a few different things relating to TRT.

My buddy was also told to stop creatine even though his liver enzymes weren’t elevated “because it can cause liver damage.” I’m not a creatine expert, but I wrote a paper on it in university, and I don’t recall ever reading about it damaging the liver.
 
Jerbear said:
It does sound like issues from the statin, side effects being liver issues, blood sugar and diabetes risk and neurological issues. They do advise switching to other statins also if it hurts your liver but I wonder if these meds could be cycled too. 6 months on 6 months off say or a hard 2 years on then stop for a few years. It seems silly to have to eat healthy take supplements and exercise but still need a medication. I like the idea of using it to reverse arterial plaque then after substantial amount of time maybe not needing it anymore and eating clean etc for a while..
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Funny.. 3 doctors say 3 different things about my cholesterol..

It's ridiculous.. IF you don't like what your doctor tells you, just knock on the next doctor's door down the hall and thye will tell you something entirely different..
 
Daslit said:
Your experience at TrueBalance is the same as mine and a few other guys I know. Didn’t seem interested in my history and just wanted to give me a script. The consultant was also misinformed about a few different things relating to TRT.

My buddy was also told to stop creatine even though his liver enzymes weren’t elevated “because it can cause liver damage.” I’m not a creatine expert, but I wrote a paper on it in university, and I don’t recall ever reading about it damaging the liver.
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Can I ask what Truebalance did you guys go too? Was it the one in Sherwood part Edmonton?


Part of me thinks I should report them.. The lady who did all the talking etc was not a doctor or nurse.. Yet she decided all my prescriptiosn and was giving medical adivse, telling me to stop taking my thryoid meds since I have a high T3 number etc..

At least we can see through the bullshit, but majority of ppl who go there likely can not and take them word for word and truth
 
Was all telemedicine, but yeah, it’s the Sherwood Park one.

Yeah, it’s actually crazy to think it’s a non-medical professional picking the prescriptions and dosages.
Wow, that’s bad that they told you to stop with a medication they neither prescribed nor manage.
 
animal-inside said:
Can I ask what Truebalance did you guys go too? Was it the one in Sherwood part Edmonton?


Part of me thinks I should report them.. The lady who did all the talking etc was not a doctor or nurse.. Yet she decided all my prescriptiosn and was giving medical adivse, telling me to stop taking my thryoid meds since I have a high T3 number etc..

At least we can see through the bullshit, but majority of ppl who go there likely can not and take them word for word and truth
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Pretty sure there is two different clinics with very similar names from my understanding. One called TrueBalance and one called TruBalance. Truebalance seems like a clinic out of Alberta, where TruBalance is actually a part of Trutina pharmacy and is telecommunication only and puts you in touch with a doctor who works with them Canada wide.

Frustrating situation man, seems like a lot of clinics are hit or miss with their quality.
 
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