ACTH stress tess

[Guest guest]

How does one go about getting this test done? What sort of doctor does it? I

have an

endocrinologist appt. on Monday morning (due to lots of reproductive hormonal

problem

symptoms other than stress-related, but I also have hypo-adrenal symptoms). Does

an

endocrinologist do an ACTH stress test?

[Guest guest]

Andy touches on the test on p 184 of " Amalgam Illness " . Basically

there would be a blood draw to measure ACTH and cortisol. Then the

person would exercise (say climbing the stairs or whatever is

appropriate for that person) for a period of time and then immediately

draw blood again for measuring ACTH and cortisol. A decline in either

or both suggests that the adrenals are not responding properly to stress.

It would take getting a doctor to write the test order, and then

planning with the blood draw clinic. A person would want to be sure

that they don't get stressed on the way to the clinic, that they have

some time to calm down before the first blood draw, that the same

person does both blood draws, and that the clinic makes sure that the

second blood draw is immediately after the exercise.

The other test that you might be thinking of is called an ACTH stim

test. There is a blood draw to get a baseline cortisol, then ACTH is

injected and then samples are drawn at timed intervals to determine

cortisol levels. This test basically tests to see if the adrenals are

responding to ACTH (which is the signal they get from the brain). The

test only picks up on adrenal dysfunction if the adrenals are 80% or

more gone and it doesn't pick up on dysfunction of other parts of the

HPA axis (hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal). It has to be ordered by an

endocrinologist and performed in a hospital.

Endocrinologists often don't pick up on adrenal dysfunction until the

person is near death. They ignore everything under 80% dysfunction

and they often don't pick up on pituitary dysfunction. I hope I am

wrong (about this particular one) for your sake, just what I have

found from talking to people with full blown 's. Most had a

horrific time getting diagnosed.

J

>

> How does one go about getting this test done? What sort of doctor

does it? I have an

> endocrinologist appt. on Monday morning (due to lots of reproductive

hormonal problem

> symptoms other than stress-related, but I also have hypo-adrenal

symptoms). Does an

> endocrinologist do an ACTH stress test?

>

>

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