[Martian Martin]

"What gets measured get managed" - Peter Drucker.

Has anyone here ever had their Blood work done for the purposes of tracking certain markers throughout a period to measure the success/changes of a specific fitness regime?

It seems like a more empirical way of measuring your achievements and I was just wondering if anyone had done so before and if so what tips they would have???

Thanks!

[Librium]

what markers?

[Mellor]

Originally Posted by Martian Martin

Has anyone here ever had their Blood work done for the purposes of tracking certain markers throughout a period to measure the success/changes of a specific fitness regime?

As above, What markers are you talking about.

It seems like a more empirical way of measuring your achievements and I was just wondering if anyone had done so before and if so what tips they would have???

How would it be more empirical?
If you are trying to increase strength or mass, or reduce body fat, or simply improve fitness. It seams quite empirical to me to measure and track strength, muscle mass, body fat or performance respectively.
Maybe you are talking about a different measure of fitness, so that be more clear once you clarify what markers you refer to.

[TommyKnocker]

The way I see it is that there are enough hypercondriacs tying up GP's surgeries and A&E depts without me adding to the issue, so I make do with measuring my resting heart rate, weight, bodyfat, how I look in a mirror, how my clothes fit, how quickly I recover after periods of excertion, how often I am sick (colds, misc infections etc, which is hardly ever(touch wood)) and how I gererally feel in myself.

As long as none of the above give me cause for concern, then I am fine

However I am an active platelets donor, so my blood gets checked on a fairly regular basis and I am sure if there was anything up I would be informed.

[siochain]

TommyKnocker I would tend to disagree, for the last 8 or so years I have a full blood check done every 6 months, LDL, HDL, Lp (a), c reactive protein. white cells, red cells, PSA etc.

I'm no hypercondriac but I am serious about my health, what I am doing is taking a proactive approch to my health, I’m fit and healthy and plan to stay that way for as long as possible. I’m paying my €60 to have it done and this will hopefully keep me away from A&E and trying up a hospital bed for a long time.

[Martian Martin]

I am looking to see if anyone has proactively gone and had a range of Blood test done in
order to track any trends in ANY of the below areas like

Circulating tumor cells
Carcinoembryonic Antigen
Lipid counts such as LDL or HDL or importantly Triglycerides
Glucose
Calcium
Magnesium
Creatine
B12
Angiogenisis indicators such as LYVE-1, VEGFR-3, Prox1, and podoplanin

Hope this clears up any confusion.

[Martian Martin]

Originally Posted by siochain

TommyKnocker I would tend to disagree, for the last 8 or so years I have a full blood check done every 6 months, LDL, HDL, Lp (a), c reactive protein. white cells, red cells, PSA etc.

I'm no hypercondriac but I am serious about my health, what I am doing is taking a proactive approch to my health, I’m fit and healthy and plan to stay that way for as long as possible. I’m paying my €60 to have it done and this will hopefully keep me away from A&E and trying up a hospital bed for a long time.

Thanks for your reply - would you mind sharing where you got it done?

[Mickk]

Yep I get my bloods done twice a year. The D2 Medical centre will do everything for 55 euro the first visit and 35 euro after that. First time I went I found that my iron was off the charts and was basically poisoning me, making me really tired and lazy. It was from the amount of red meat I eat...

[Librium]

Originally Posted by Mickk

Yep I get my bloods done twice a year. The D2 Medical centre will do everything for 55 euro the first visit and 35 euro after that. First time I went I found that my iron was off the charts and was basically poisoning me, making me really tired and lazy. It was from the amount of red meat I eat...

did they talk to you about haemochromatosis ?

[Mellor]

Originally Posted by Martian Martin

Circulating tumor cells
Carcinoembryonic Antigen
Lipid counts such as LDL or HDL or importantly Triglycerides
Glucose
Calcium
Magnesium
Creatine
B12
Angiogenisis indicators such as LYVE-1, VEGFR-3, Prox1, and podoplanin

Hope this clears up any confusion.

That clears it up a bit.

I've a question though.
For the first few, (tumour, carcinoembryonic, lipids), are they mostly related to fitness, or are there other factors involved that make the cause of changes harder to pinpoint.

As for the others, how much would those levels fluctuate over a short period of time in response to diet. Eg If I had a lot of sugar/carbs before bloods were taken, would glucose be higher? If next time, I happened to have a chicken salad, would it be lower.
I would imagine the more something fluctuates over a short time, the less useful a pinpoint measurement is. Completely speculating here, don't know much about these at all.

[siochain]

Originally Posted by Martian Martin

Thanks for your reply - would you mind sharing where you got it done?

Most gps can do this, you book to go in early as you need to be fasted. Bloods are sent off and you get your results in about 5 days.

[Mickk]

Originally Posted by Librium

did they talk to you about haemochromatosis ?

Yea I was over the 55% saturation rate so I got a free test but it was negative, just too much red meat!

[Martian Martin]

Originally Posted by siochain

Most gps can do this, you book to go in early as you need to be fasted. Bloods are sent off and you get your results in about 5 days.

Thanks - for some reason I thought it would be something do through a walk in clinic

[Martian Martin]

Originally Posted by Mellor

That clears it up a bit.

I've a question though.
For the first few, (tumour, carcinoembryonic, lipids), are they mostly related to fitness, or are there other factors involved that make the cause of changes harder to pinpoint.

As for the others, how much would those levels fluctuate over a short period of time in response to diet. Eg If I had a lot of sugar/carbs before bloods were taken, would glucose be higher? If next time, I happened to have a chicken salad, would it be lower.
I would imagine the more something fluctuates over a short time, the less useful a pinpoint measurement is. Completely speculating here, don't know much about these at all.

No, you are correct-they are not necessarily related to fitness but... as I would like to try out (for example) Paleo for a period I would like to keep a measurement on certain markers (as a baseline) and then have them measured again as I progress through with a Paleo Diet.

As for fluctuation, that would be very common in some markers especially in the case of things like Triglycerides but this would be negated as best as can be by fasting for a period before - they exact same as if you have ever been for blood tests to check out Heart irregularities/chest pains etc

[Martian Martin]

Originally Posted by Mickk

Yep I get my bloods done twice a year. The D2 Medical centre will do everything for 55 euro the first visit and 35 euro after that. First time I went I found that my iron was off the charts and was basically poisoning me, making me really tired and lazy. It was from the amount of red meat I eat...

A common problem/finding amongst Men supposedly- one of the (possibly only) downside of Men not having periods!