What's more important IGF-1 levels or GH serum test.

[Thebigone]

It’s crazy that tren lowers IGF1 to nothing yet all freaks use tren and high dose HGH precontest, and they get amazing results! This tells me not to worry about IGF1 numbers.

I wonder if it's a false reading. Just like Tren can show a drastic increase in estrogen as a false reading.

 

[Kaladryn]

I wonder if it's a false reading. Just like Tren can show a drastic increase in estrogen as a false reading.

Tren actually binds and activates the estrogen receptor (with a low affinity) which is why shows up on some bloodwork as E2, so I'd guess it is unrelated.

 

[Kaladryn]

A BIG part of the reason people often can't convert GH to IGF-1 efficiently is because they have a mineral or some other deficiency, such as zinc, etc. These substances are ESSENTIAL for maximizing IGF-1 conversion in the liver, as well as maximizing IGFBP-3 levels. IGFBP-3, although rarely mentioned on the boards, is a CRITICAL hormone for maximizing IGF-1 usability and half-life, as it not only serves as a the primary transporter of IGF-1 (bringing it directly to the muscle cells), but it greatly extends the half-life of IGF-1 in the body. Without optimizing IGFBP-3 levels, you cannot optimize IGF-1 bioavailability or half-life.

There are MANY factors which determine someone's IGF-1 levels and usability...NOT just how much GH the person is taking/producing. This narrow minded point of view is responsible for many of the poor lab tests we have seen from guys who are using good GH, as well as their lack of results.

This is just dogma, trying to rationalize fake or crappy GH. Look at the studies on GH, how many subjects in those studies don't show IGF-1 increases? Answer, zero.

There is a strong push to rationalize GH that doesn't work on these boards.

 

[kinglewy]

I tend to buy the gh that scores the highest serum number....igf is great but look how many guys run growth and the igf numbers are lower than you would expect...im with jjb1 I dont car about igf I go for the serum scores in the 30's

 

[kinglewy]

This is just dogma, trying to rationalize fake or crappy GH. Look at the studies on GH, how many subjects in those studies don't show IGF-1 increases? Answer, zero.

There is a strong push to rationalize GH that doesn't work on these boards.

Yes but how many of the studies are done on guys using tren and orals? Those will mess with the conversion and give an inaccurate result

 

[G.I.Bro]

This is just dogma, trying to rationalize fake or crappy GH. Look at the studies on GH, how many subjects in those studies don't show IGF-1 increases? Answer, zero.

There is a strong push to rationalize GH that doesn't work on these boards.

Thank you for stating that Kaladryn. If your IGF-1 results are shit, the IGF-1 is shit. Gh serum test is a bare minimum. If you want to know if it's legit quality gh, you need IGF-1. Malformed gh chain, or certain chain /peptide configurations that are not gh, can give a high gh serum result yet do jack shit. Think of IGF-1 increase as the result of opening a lock with a key. The key being a properly formed chain that activates at the receptor. Without that, no benefits.

 

[sub7percent]

Malformed gh chain, or certain chain /peptide configurations that are not gh, can give a high gh serum result yet do jack shit. Think of IGF-1 increase as the result of opening a lock with a key. The key being a properly formed chain that activates at the receptor. Without that, no benefits.

So those tests done by Jano - if I see a test with high purity and low dimer, does that tell me what I want to know with regards to your post above? i.e., whether it is "a properly formed chain" that can "open a lock with a key"

Thanks.



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[G.I.Bro]

So those tests done by Jano - if I see a test with high purity and low dimer, does that tell me what I want to know with regards to your post above? i.e., whether it is "a properly formed chain" that can "open a lock with a key"

Thanks.

In general "dimer and related proteins" identifies foreign unwanted proteins in the product as well as the presence deactivated GH. Foreign proteins, over a long period of use, may lead under to antibodies and lowered effect of GH in the body. This is not ideal at all. The deactivated GH, on the other hand, simply lowers the potency of the product but has no ramifications beyond that.

So ya, high purity and low dimer is ideal. Its indicative of a high quality production process. You can have legit GH with a lower purity and a higher dimer. Its still real GH but the purity and production is not as good and you get more of the dimer. Official greys typically score among the best for Chinese GH and I believe that is because they are produced and backdoor'd into black market by Anke Biotech (a legit Chinese pharma). This is merely an "allegation" and rumor though.

Dimers and related proteins are tested for by SEC-HPLC.

Basically, dimer is just two molecules of HGH that are sticking together - there is no 'chemical linkage' between them, therefore their bond is called noncovalent - but they are sticking together due to other forces than direct chemical bond. There was an article by Junnila in 2008 suggesting other possibilities in vivo, but that does not concern us, imo.

Dimer content is generally considered a sign of prolonged storage or improper storage or manufacturing conditions and is thought to have reduced effectiveness.

"A noncovalent dimer of the 22 kilodalton human growth hormone (22 K-hGH) is known to have diminished somatogenic activity compared with monomeric 22 K-hGH. " Nagatomi, 2000

Dimers don't show on RP-HPLC, due to the nature of the test, so that explains the discrepancy.
Dimers show as normal proper HGH on RP-HPLC method and they are included in mg/IU per vial.

If anybody is interested into dimers and problematic of therapeutic protein aggregation, here is a good link for a free article on pubmed: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4266928/

RP-HPLC purity is giving us information about other impurities - like desamidosomatropin form of HGH etc, which again, points to either prolonged storage or improper storage or manufacturing conditions.

- Credit to Karl of Sciroxx for this quote portion.

I would recommend Official Greys, Blacks (meditrope) and Karl's (sciroxx) western biotech branded orange top GH. I feel that all 3 of these are solid choices and are legit GH. The differences you will see here could be production purity related.

Shout out to Muscles96ss - hoping his health struggles have improved. His absence is felt in the GH discussions IMO....

 

[MyNameIsJeff]

Thank you for stating that Kaladryn. If your IGF-1 results are shit, the IGF-1 is shit. Gh serum test is a bare minimum. If you want to know if it's legit quality gh, you need IGF-1. Malformed gh chain, or certain chain /peptide configurations that are not gh, can give a high gh serum result yet do jack shit. Think of IGF-1 increase as the result of opening a lock with a key. The key being a properly formed chain that activates at the receptor. Without that, no benefits.

Actually that is incorrect. Here is what you can logically infer from each test, where '->' denotes an implication arrow:

Low level or zero in HGH serum test -> HGH is fake or underdosed
High level in HGH serum test -> real, properly dosed HGH, and either (1)bioactive or (2) incorrectly folded/not bioactive (i exclude the case where GHRHs are in the product, since these would not be able to increase blood levels to the levels seen with 10IU of HGH)

Low level in IGF1 blood test -> Either (1) HGH is fake, or underdosed, or not bioactive (2) HGH is real and bioactive, but a confounding factor prevented rise in IGF1 levels (Tren, SERMs, AIs, liver damage, Metformin, changes in insulin sensitivity, Insulin use, change in micronutrient status, stress,...)
High level in IGF1 blood test -> Either (1) HGH is fake, or underdosed, or not bioactive, BUT a positive change in other factors occurred (stopped taking SERM, etc from list above) or (2) HGH is real and bioactive

So in conclusion, we cannot generally infer anything from IGF1 blood tests! Only if the tester is extremely diligent in keeping the multitude of other factors that influence IGF1 levels stable, can he infer whether his HGH is real and bioactive.

HGH serum tests, on the other hand, do tell you something definitive. Namely, if the test is negative, you can generally infer that the HGH is fake. The only thing that needs to be controlled is the time from injection to blood draw. if the test is positive, however, this again does not tell you much, since the HGH may or may not be bioactive. Then again, in all the testing by Janoshik, the HGH was correctly folded in every case. And I have never seen a laboratory test of HGH that showed the product to be incorrectly folded. Furthermore, the dimer count tends to be lower than 10% in even the crappiest brands of HGH, so this should not be a problem in terms of bioactivity either. And even if it is 192aa HGH (Which again is a very rare sight nowadays), it is still bioactive.
So my personal assumption is that the chance of facing incorrectly folded/not bioactive HGH is extremely small. If you are willing to make that same assumption, then having a positive HGH serum test does in fact provide very strong evidence that the HGH is legit and will increase IGF1 levels, ceteris paribus.

If you are not convinced by that, then the only reliable way of testing is by a laboratory, such as the one by Janoshik. These tests can determine whether the 3D structure of the product is consistent with real, correctly folded HGH, and therefore determines the quantity, purity, and bioactivity of your sample. it might be a bit more pricey than HGH serum and IGF1 blood tests, but you will have the highest level of certainty. If it's too expensive for you, consider making a donation to the PM testing community, whether in the form of a sample or with money. I believe this form of HGH testing is the way to go, and by crowdfunding it, the costs to the community at large would actually be lower than if everyone constantly runs their own blood tests.

 

[G.I.Bro]

Actually that is incorrect. Here is what you can logically infer from each test, where '->' denotes an implication arrow:

Low level or zero in HGH serum test -> HGH is fake or underdosed
High level in HGH serum test -> real, properly dosed HGH, and either (1)bioactive or (2) incorrectly folded/not bioactive (i exclude the case where GHRHs are in the product, since these would not be able to increase blood levels to the levels seen with 10IU of HGH)

Low level in IGF1 blood test -> Either (1) HGH is fake, or underdosed, or not bioactive (2) HGH is real and bioactive, but a confounding factor prevented rise in IGF1 levels (Tren, SERMs, AIs, liver damage, Metformin, changes in insulin sensitivity, Insulin use, change in micronutrient status, stress,...)
High level in IGF1 blood test -> Either (1) HGH is fake, or underdosed, or not bioactive, BUT a positive change in other factors occurred (stopped taking SERM, etc from list above) or (2) HGH is real and bioactive

So in conclusion, we cannot generally infer anything from IGF1 blood tests! Only if the tester is extremely diligent in keeping the multitude of other factors that influence IGF1 levels stable, can he infer whether his HGH is real and bioactive.

HGH serum tests, on the other hand, do tell you something definitive. Namely, if the test is negative, you can generally infer that the HGH is fake. The only thing that needs to be controlled is the time from injection to blood draw. if the test is positive, however, this again does not tell you much, since the HGH may or may not be bioactive. Then again, in all the testing by Janoshik, the HGH was correctly folded in every case. And I have never seen a laboratory test of HGH that showed the product to be incorrectly folded. Furthermore, the dimer count tends to be lower than 10% in even the crappiest brands of HGH, so this should not be a problem in terms of bioactivity either. And even if it is 192aa HGH (Which again is a very rare sight nowadays), it is still bioactive.
So my personal assumption is that the chance of facing incorrectly folded/not bioactive HGH is extremely small. If you are willing to make that same assumption, then having a positive HGH serum test does in fact provide very strong evidence that the HGH is legit and will increase IGF1 levels, ceteris paribus.

If you are not convinced by that, then the only reliable way of testing is by a laboratory, such as the one by Janoshik. These tests can determine whether the 3D structure of the product is consistent with real, correctly folded HGH, and therefore determines the quantity, purity, and bioactivity of your sample. it might be a bit more pricey than HGH serum and IGF1 blood tests, but you will have the highest level of certainty. If it's too expensive for you, consider making a donation to the PM testing community, whether in the form of a sample or with money. I believe this form of HGH testing is the way to go, and by crowdfunding it, the costs to the community at large would actually be lower than if everyone constantly runs their own blood tests.

Cmon there wonder britches. Nobody doubts that are multiple factors that can influence IGF-1 levels. You can have real gh and have fairly poor IGF-1 levels due to those factors, and that's quite common. But it's more worrisome that bunk gh or extremely poor quality gh can often yield a good serum score. The point of the post is that IGF-1 is more reliable and thorough to test the quality of gh and assure its legit. I don't see how anyone can disagree with that. If I'm comparing some blue tops with greys, I want IGF-1 because I know both will likely score OK on gh serum. On the other hand, you know as well as I there have been high serum scores on shit gh before. We've all seen it although I agree it's less common these days. Most of this stuff is properly folded gh. The quality differences are always where IGF-1 can separate brands. We have seen shit gh that was designed to score well on gh serum but that doesn't account for malformed/inactive gh on lower end brands.

Saying it's "wrong" just makes you sound obtuse like you want to disagree with everything. Your post is fucking stupid, I'm sorry but you need to be told that. We all know IGF-1 results can be influenced by other factors. Youre no authority here, these guys have been around the block. IGF-1 is the next best thing to advanced mass spec testing. If you want to disagree with that be my guest.

To me, gh serum is binary plus it can be fooled. If you know you're IGF-1 baseline and are a intelligent user, an IGF-1 test on gh can quickly let you know which brand tends to get your numbers up best in a controlled environment (a lot more useful). You can't just throw IGF-1 testing out with the bath water. Imo, it gives more piece of mind than GH serum.

GH serum equates to those lame AAS testing kits like Labmax or Roidtest. It only gives you a very limited piece of information.

 

[johnjuanb1]

Cmon there wonder britches. Nobody doubts that are multiple factors that can influence IGF-1 levels. You can have real gh and have fairly poor IGF-1 levels due to those factors, and that's quite common. But it's more worrisome that bunk gh or extremely poor quality gh can often yield a good serum score. The point of the post is that IGF-1 is more reliable and thorough to test the quality of gh and assure its legit. I don't see how anyone can disagree with that. If I'm comparing some blue tops with greys, I want IGF-1 because I know both will likely score OK on gh serum. On the other hand, you know as well as I there have been high serum scores on shit gh before. We've all seen it although I agree it's less common these days. Most of this stuff is properly folded gh. The quality differences are always where IGF-1 can separate brands. We have seen shit gh that was designed to score well on gh serum but that doesn't account for malformed/inactive gh on lower end brands.

Saying it's "wrong" just makes you sound obtuse like you want to disagree with everything. Your post is fucking stupid, I'm sorry but you need to be told that. We all know IGF-1 results can be influenced by other factors. Youre no authority here, these guys have been around the block. IGF-1 is the next best thing to advanced mass spec testing. If you want to disagree with that be my guest.

To me, gh serum is binary plus it can be fooled. If you know you're IGF-1 baseline and are a intelligent user, an IGF-1 test on gh can quickly let you know which brand tends to get your numbers up best in a controlled environment (a lot more useful). You can't just throw IGF-1 testing out with the bath water. Imo, it gives more piece of mind than GH serum.

GH serum equates to those lame AAS testing kits like Labmax or Roidtest. It only gives you a very limited piece of information.

Is it a mistake to take tren witb legit HGH?

 

[G.I.Bro]

Is it a mistake to take tren witb legit HGH?

No. But if you're doing a controlled IGF-1 test against your baseline for purposes of comparing, then yes. In that situation you really need to be doing TRT or cruise dose and compare to the same dose test and no gh for a baseline IGF-1 reading. Things like tren, nolvadex, metformin, hard dieting (low carb) and liver stress will all diminish IGF-1 levels even on pharma like Norditropin.

 

[MyNameIsJeff]

Cmon there wonder britches. Nobody doubts that are multiple factors that can influence IGF-1 levels. You can have real gh and have fairly poor IGF-1 levels due to those factors, and that's quite common. But it's more worrisome that bunk gh or extremely poor quality gh can often yield a good serum score. The point of the post is that IGF-1 is more reliable and thorough to test the quality of gh and assure its legit. I don't see how anyone can disagree with that. If I'm comparing some blue tops with greys, I want IGF-1 because I know both will likely score OK on gh serum. On the other hand, you know as well as I there have been high serum scores on shit gh before. We've all seen it although I agree it's less common these days. Most of this stuff is properly folded gh. The quality differences are always where IGF-1 can separate brands. We have seen shit gh that was designed to score well on gh serum but that doesn't account for malformed/inactive gh on lower end brands.

Saying it's "wrong" just makes you sound obtuse like you want to disagree with everything. Your post is fucking stupid, I'm sorry but you need to be told that. We all know IGF-1 results can be influenced by other factors. Youre no authority here, these guys have been around the block. IGF-1 is the next best thing to advanced mass spec testing. If you want to disagree with that be my guest.

To me, gh serum is binary plus it can be fooled. If you know you're IGF-1 baseline and are a intelligent user, an IGF-1 test on gh can quickly let you know which brand tends to get your numbers up best in a controlled environment (a lot more useful). You can't just throw IGF-1 testing out with the bath water. Imo, it gives more piece of mind than GH serum.

GH serum equates to those lame AAS testing kits like Labmax or Roidtest. It only gives you a very limited piece of information.

Just stating facts in the post pal, whether or not I'm an 'authority' here doesn't change anything about that.

I stated that "we cannot generally infer anything from IGF1 blood tests! Only if the tester is extremely diligent in keeping the multitude of other factors that influence IGF1 levels stable, can he infer whether his HGH is real and bioactive. "
I'm not denying that IGF1 test would be useful if we were able to control all those other factors. The thing is, the vast majority of people are either unable or unwilling to do so. Are you really gonna keep your cycle exactly the same for another month just so that you can get a proper IGF1 reading? Not to mention that many drugs stay in the system for very long and have an impact on the hormonal system for even longer. And even if you were to keep your hormone levels perfectly in check, there is a shit ton of other factors that simply are not under your control and/or which you don't observe. You clearly overestimate your ability to keep the other factors constant, and that leads you to the wrong conclusion that IGF1 is " more reliable and thorough to test the quality of gh and assure its legit".
But take it from actual authority Mike Arnold that "This narrow minded point of view is responsible for many of the poor lab tests we have seen from guys who are using good GH[...]"

So practically speaking, IGF1 tests are not reliable and you cannot infer whether your HGH is good or not with any degree of certainty.

Not to mention that using IGF1 tests to compare how good different brands are (as you suggest) is even more futile. An HGH serum test is similarly useless for this purpose though.

The following are not facts, but just my speculation, here you may well disagree with me. You refer to examples of shit HGH scoring well on serum tests, but never has anyone ever seen a laboratory test of such a 'shit' HGH that still scored high on serum tests. I think it was Kaladryn who argued about this topic with Janoshik, and the conclusion of that was that there is no simple way of producing non-bioactive HGH like there is with other peptides. So any HGH that does score well on serum tests will in fact be recombinant. Furthermore, it is not at all clear that producing shitty HGH with improper folding would be any cheaper than producing legit HGH. Sure, low quality HGH will have more dimers and impurities, but even amateurs should still be able to produce <10% without much higher costs. So if those score well on serum tests, they will also contain enough bioactive HGH to have a decent effect (Though more side effects may occur).
I'd be glad to change my mind on this if you were able to provide any kind of evidence for the claim that an HGH product that scored well on serum was in fact 'shit'. As explained above, the only way of showing this would be with a laboratory analysis, which remains elusive.

I'm clearly not saying that serum tests are conclusive either. But at least they can tell you something. The gold standard is laboratory testing, I think we agree on that.

 

[G.I.Bro]

Just stating facts in the post pal, whether or not I'm an 'authority' here doesn't change anything about that.

I stated that "we cannot generally infer anything from IGF1 blood tests! Only if the tester is extremely diligent in keeping the multitude of other factors that influence IGF1 levels stable, can he infer whether his HGH is real and bioactive. "
I'm not denying that IGF1 test would be useful if we were able to control all those other factors. The thing is, the vast majority of people are either unable or unwilling to do so. Are you really gonna keep your cycle exactly the same for another month just so that you can get a proper IGF1 reading? Not to mention that many drugs stay in the system for very long and have an impact on the hormonal system for even longer. And even if you were to keep your hormone levels perfectly in check, there is a shit ton of other factors that simply are not under your control and/or which you don't observe. You clearly overestimate your ability to keep the other factors constant, and that leads you to the wrong conclusion that IGF1 is " more reliable and thorough to test the quality of gh and assure its legit".
But take it from actual authority Mike Arnold that "This narrow minded point of view is responsible for many of the poor lab tests we have seen from guys who are using good GH[...]"

So practically speaking, IGF1 tests are not reliable and you cannot infer whether your HGH is good or not with any degree of certainty.

Not to mention that using IGF1 tests to compare how good different brands are (as you suggest) is even more futile. An HGH serum test is similarly useless for this purpose though.

The following are not facts, but just my speculation, here you may well disagree with me. You refer to examples of shit HGH scoring well on serum tests, but never has anyone ever seen a laboratory test of such a 'shit' HGH that still scored high on serum tests. I think it was Kaladryn who argued about this topic with Janoshik, and the conclusion of that was that there is no simple way of producing non-bioactive HGH like there is with other peptides. So any HGH that does score well on serum tests will in fact be recombinant. Furthermore, it is not at all clear that producing shitty HGH with improper folding would be any cheaper than producing legit HGH. Sure, low quality HGH will have more dimers and impurities, but even amateurs should still be able to produce <10% without much higher costs. So if those score well on serum tests, they will also contain enough bioactive HGH to have a decent effect (Though more side effects may occur).
I'd be glad to change my mind on this if you were able to provide any kind of evidence for the claim that an HGH product that scored well on serum was in fact 'shit'. As explained above, the only way of showing this would be with a laboratory analysis, which remains elusive.

I'm clearly not saying that serum tests are conclusive either. But at least they can tell you something. The gold standard is laboratory testing, I think we agree on that.

We agree lab testing is the best. I personally like to run IGF-1 on a brand before committing to use much of it. Most of what you said I can't disagree with though. I just don't think it's as useless as you do. You obviously have a decent understanding compared to many members and I hope you keep posting and contributing.