Background: 40 year old male. Ran heavy steroid cycles from 20-26 or so (never came off), 4 back surgeries requiring lots of narcotics over the years. This combo as well as perhaps genetics has left me with low testosterone levels naturally. I live in Canada and through an endo I have been put on TRT for the rest of my life as my normal test levels were around 6nmol total over 3 different tests and I had basically all the symptoms present.
Now for the last 6 months I have been on 100mg Test E weekly, split into 2 subQ shots. With only 100mgs weekly my last 2 blood tests came back with very high free test, average total and very low shbg. I am confused as to why my free is so high and total somewhat normal, I realize shbg plays a huge role here but I didnt think it would be this drastic. My doc bases doses directly off free test rather than total, so he wants to drop my dose down to 70-80mgs a week. Is this the correct approach? I feel great at 100mgs.
Latest test results (Canada so units may be different than yours):
Total Test: 15.8nmol Range: 5.8-28nmol
Free Androgen Index: 143.6 Range: 14.8-94.8
SHBG: 11nmol Range: 13-71nmol
Thanks for any insight. Also, this is kind of a blast from the past as I was a fairly active member here 18 or so years ago under a different name. Wasn't sure if this site was still alive
Now for the last 6 months I have been on 100mg Test E weekly, split into 2 subQ shots. With only 100mgs weekly my last 2 blood tests came back with very high free test, average total and very low shbg. I am confused as to why my free is so high and total somewhat normal, I realize shbg plays a huge role here but I didnt think it would be this drastic. My doc bases doses directly off free test rather than total, so he wants to drop my dose down to 70-80mgs a week. Is this the correct approach? I feel great at 100mgs.
Latest test results (Canada so units may be different than yours):
Total Test: 15.8nmol Range: 5.8-28nmol
Free Androgen Index: 143.6 Range: 14.8-94.8
SHBG: 11nmol Range: 13-71nmol
Thanks for any insight. Also, this is kind of a blast from the past as I was a fairly active member here 18 or so years ago under a different name. Wasn't sure if this site was still alive