0 (1s): Hello, and welcome to the get lean and eat clean podcast. My name is Brian grin. I'm a certified health coach, trainer and author. And this podcast is for middle-aged men and women looking to optimize their health and get their bodies back to what it once was 10 to 15 years ago. I will give you simple, actionable items to get long-term sustainable results. Thanks for listening and enjoy the show. All right. Welcome to the get lean eat clean podcast. My name is Bryan grin. I hope you had a great weekend. Hopefully the weather is starting to turn in your area. I'm in Chicago and it has not, but it's looking like this next week is going to start getting warmer towards mother's day. 0 (47s): So either way, hopefully you listen to my interview with London Sousa this past Friday, a lot of great tips and great energy boosters, ways to sort of get around mindset when it comes to weight loss. So definitely check out that interview with London. And today I wanted to touch on a topic we've touched on in this podcast quite a bit. I would say with some of my guests and that's blood testing, I'm a big proponent of getting sort of a baseline to know where you're at. And some of these I'm going to go through some of the important blood markers, not all of them, cause that would be a long episode, but some of them are, I would say relevant ones that I think you should take out a pen and paper and write them down. 0 (1m 33s): If you, if you, you know, if you're going to see your doctor soon, or if you just want to go to a, you know, like a lab Corp and I get it done on your own, which can be done as well. Obviously I've done that for myself. So I want to touch on some of the blood tests and the importance of them. So get a pen and paper out and, and let's, and let's hit on the important, the important ones, because we got to know where we're at. And I think there's a sort of this mainstream medical community emphasizing, okay, total cholesterol, high, total cholesterol, high total LDL. And let's put you on a Staton and you gotta dig deeper than that. And you really do it's context dependent. 0 (2m 14s): I recently interviewed Dr. Brett Shaw, which is not out yet, but will come out. So look out for that. We talk about this, but the thing was Statens is they reduce all levels, all forms of cholesterol in your bloodstream. And so there is a time and a place for certain individuals, but for most people they don't need them and they can find other ways to, to avoid taking the Statens. Cause if you listen to my interview with Dr. Robert Lustig, that you'll see that there's, there's, there's only a small percentage of people that probably really do need them. So either way, let's touch on that a little bit, but one ratio that I think you should look at is triglycerides to HDL ratio. 0 (3m 0s): And this is if you talk to probably most doctors, I would assume that they would think that this is an important metrics and it's triglycerides to HDL a ratio of about 3.5 to one or below is desirable while a ratio of like 1.1, I'm sorry. One-to-one is considered like superior. So definitely check that out. If you've gotten a recent blood test, if not write that down and check out that ratio, because essentially this is the ratio between triglycerides to HDL is, is if you have excessive triglycerides, a lot of times that's driven by sugar, processed carbs, excess insulin production, and the conversion of excess ingested carbs into triglycerides in the liver. 0 (3m 47s): So high triglycerides indicates the body's cholesterol processing system is just overwhelmed. On the other side of the ratio of the HDL, the body's, you know, sufficiently high levels of HDL can effectively remove these dangerous, small, dense cholesterol molecules from your bloodstream. So elevating HDL, reducing triglycerides is a worthwhile tandem to help reduce heart disease risk. So check that ratio out. Blood pressure is my next one. Obviously this seems like a simplistic one, but this is something that sometimes gets overlooked and, you know, hypertension puts excessive stress on the cardiovascular system increases disease risk. 0 (4m 33s): So high blood pressure is definitely a reliable indicator of unhealthy dietary exercise and lifestyle habits. So experts agree that a safe blood pressure in this, I don't think has changed much over the years. Threshold is a one 20 over 80 or a bit lower. So blood pressure is number two. This is in no particular order. We're going to talk vitamin D levels, especially for people who are, you know, not getting a ton of sun it's over the winter. If you're in Chicago or the Midwest, most of your vitamin D is obtained primarily through sun exposure to like the, your back your chest. 0 (5m 14s): It's not just to your face or your arms. And, you know, there's certain foods that can maybe help increase those levels. The sun is the best exposure and I've done some, I think I did actually. I don't think I know I did a podcast just on vitamin D. So check that one out. So supplementing over the winter can, can be beneficial. Vitamin D status should be assessed by this serum 25 OHD test. So just ask your doctor. You want to get your vitamin D levels checked anything above 30 Nana middlers excuse me. Nanomoles per milliliter is acceptable. Anything above 30 50 is a safer target. 0 (5m 57s): So you'll see different varying levels all over, but that's a good range right there. It's not only more. It's not only the more is better. You can actually get too high, which I don't think happens too often. Vitamin D toxicity. It, I would eventually say, I would say venture to say that it's unique and sensitive individuals, maybe who are overdoing it with supplements, but either way, get your levels checks. If you're below 30, then you should probably take, get some sunlight or maybe some quality supplementation. The next indicator is fasting blood insulin doctors, frequently order these fasting glucose blood tests, which is sort of a mainstay. 0 (6m 43s): And we're seeing a lot of this, you know, continuous glucose monitors, these CGMs, which I've worn from time to time, but we never really see people ordering a fasting insulin tests. And there's clear evidence that hyperinsulinemia represents a serious health concern. So get your fasting, blood insulin tested, optimal levels. You know, this again might vary depending on where you go between three and eight micro international units per milliliter. And you don't have to worry so much about that, but it's between three and eight and even some functional medical practitioners, we use actually 10 international units for milliliter as an upper limit. 0 (7m 29s): So either way, get your fasting blood insulin checked next is HB A1C, which essentially is, it is fairly a reliable marker in the sense that it takes like your average blood glucose over a two to three month period. But like I mentioned, glucose is, is, you know, sort of pigeonholed it's, it's not the only thing in fasting. Insulin is probably a little bit more, but this one gives you an average, as opposed to, you know, this is superior to just getting your blood glucose taken for one period in the day where, you know, who knows what could have affected it, maybe it's stress or, or, you know, not getting enough sleep, but HBA one C under like 5.7 is considered normal. 0 (8m 14s): You know, anything above, I'd say 6.5 could be in the form of potentially diabetic range triglycerides. Like I mentioned before, you'll want to get those tested. Cause then you'll know your triglycerides to HDL and most tests have those another one, which is regarding more of like inflammation and that's high sensitive C reactive protein HS CRP. And if you have high levels of CRP in your blood, this is a reliable sign of inflammation in the blood vessels. So elevated CRP is associated with increased heart attack stroke, maybe sudden cardiac death. 0 (8m 55s): So CRP levels are supposedly about 10 milligrams per liter. And, you know, if you have an acute effect infection or acute stressors, you might experience a temporary increase in CRP. So, you know, if you ran a race or I don't know, even maybe had a hard workout, you might have elevated levels typically for maybe a day or two, but they'll return back to normal after a few days. So just keep an eye on that. So definitely check out your HS CRP levels. Homocysteine is an amino acid, which could be elevated and that could cause can increase your risk of heart attack stroke or blood clots. 0 (9m 41s): A lot of times, if you have any vitamin and mineral deficiencies that can lead to elevator elevated levels too. So, so, you know, homelessness is a decent general health marker to track as well. Another one is something called there's a few more regarding inflammation. I APO B APO B measures of protein residing in all LDL particles. So high levels indicate that you have elevated LDL particle number and elevated heart disease risk. We'll talk about LDL L I think it's important, especially if, for individuals that have high LDL and total cholesterol that they, they, they, one thing they might want to do is follow up with what's called a particle size test, and that'll give you a better picture. 0 (10m 27s): Yeah. So LDL particle size, it's like an advanced lipid profile testing because you have two LDLs, you have a type a and a type B the type a is this large fluffy LDL, which is not linked, is dangerously as the small dense LDL. And you gotta figure out which one you have more of in the high triglyceride levels suggest that, you know, there could be a type V values that may be elevated because of blood triglyceride levels determine, you know, which VLDL converts into large, fluffy, small dense L molecules. So the bottom line is you'll want to do a LDL particle size test. 0 (11m 9s): If you have high levels of LDL and total cholesterol, this along with a coronary calcium test really will give you provide a clear understanding of your potential heart disease risk. So these are not standard tests that you're going to get as part of a physical exam, but you can request this to your, to your doctor and a coronary calcium test measures. The calcium buildup in the arteries via CT scan is a strong indication of AF sclero atherosclerosis. Sorry. Anyway, so there you go. These are just some of the tests that I think you should take a look at, and I'll just repeat them one more time. 0 (11m 53s): Get that pen and paper out triglycerides to HDL blood, the triglycerides HDL ratio, excuse me, the blood pressure vitamin D levels, fasting blood insulin HBA, one C triglycerides, H C, excuse me, HS CRP, a homocysteine and APL B. And then last, the last two are LDL particle size, which is a sort of advanced testing and then coronary calcium testing. So hopefully this helps. Let me know if you have any questions. These are just a few of the ones I think you should start with, especially for heart disease risk and any inflammation. 0 (12m 33s): So let me know if you have any questions and you can email me brian@briangreen.com and have a great day. And if you love the podcast, feel free to review it. I would love that. Thanks and talk to you on Friday. Thanks for listening. The get lean, eat clean podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there and you've chosen to listen to mine. And I appreciate that. Check out the show notes@briangrin.com for everything that was mentioned in this episode, feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member. That's looking to get their body back to what it once was. Thanks again, and have a great day.
