Saliva Test or Blood Spot - What's Best?

Whether to use a saliva test or a blood spot test is primarily a matter of personal preference. Both are easy and accurate. Both can be taken at home, and the results mailed to the lab.

With the saliva test, you spit into a tube first thing in the morning (or more often with some of the tests). Since you have to collect about a tablespoon of saliva, if you tend to not have a lot of saliva, the blood spot test might be easier.

The blood spot test involves a nearly painless finger stick to provide a few drops of blood on a small piece of blotting paper. If you're queasy about the sight of blood, the saliva test might be easier.

Both tests are placed in a prepaid mailer to be sent to the lab for analysis and results.

Blood Spot vs. Serum Blood Tests

The blood spot test is not the same as the serum blood tests that your doctor sends you to a lab for. The blood spot test measures capillary blood, which gives an accurate measure of bioavailable hormones, while the serum blood test measures the hormones found in the serum, or watery part of the blood, which does not give an accurate measure of bioavailable hormones

Saliva Testing of Hormones

***Why test saliva?

Because steroid hormones play such a vital role in maintenance of health, knowledge of an imbalance in any one or more hormones can help illuminate the cause of health problems and provide a rational basis for correcting the imbalance through diet, exercise, or hormone supplementation. Are the levels of steroid hormones in blood and saliva the same? When the various glands manufacture the steroids they are released into the bloodstream bound to carrier proteins. Only a small fraction (1-5%) of a given amount of steroid hormone breaks loose from the carrier protein in the bloodstream and is free to enter target tissues. This free or unbound hormone is what we want to measure, since it is active or bioavailable to the target tissues such as the breast, uterus, brain, and skin.

Many studies in the scientific literature have shown that there is a strong correlation between the levels of steroid hormones in saliva and the bioavailable (free) levels of steroids in the bloodstream. The amount of steroid hormone that enters the salivary ducts and then saliva, is representative of the fraction of steroids in the bloodstream that are bioavailable to other tissues in the body. Advantages of saliva vs blood testing of steroid hormones Saliva collection is easy, can be done anywhere, any time and at a much lower cost. Serum hormone testing is stressful, and the stress of a blood draw can sometimes alter the result. Blood has to be drawn at a doctor's office or drawing station, and it is more difficult to obtain samples at the desired times (e.g. early am), multiple times through the day or late evening. There is also an extra cost involved in drawing blood, independent of the cost for the test itself.

Hormones in saliva are exceptionally stable, allowing wide latitude in collection and shipment. Samples can be stored at room temperature for at least a week without loss of activity, so samples can be shipped to the testing facility by regular mail. Blood, on the other hand, must be kept cool on ice packs, increasing costs for shipping as well as the likelihood of error due to improper handling.

Finally, as outlined in the following section, saliva hormone testing allows you to take more control over your own health. Saliva testing may help you to gain insight into health problems before you see your doctor. It will also allow you to monitor a natural hormone supplementation program (eg natural progesterone cream or DHEA are widely available at holistic health practitioner's offices) if improvement in quality of life, disease prevention, or anti-aging is your goal.

How Can Saliva Hormone Tests Help You? There are several ways salivary hormone tests can help you to take responsibility for, and optimize your health. Hormone testing can be used to guide supplementation, to determine if an oral hormone supplement such as DHEA is being absorbed, and if the dosage is appropriate. Bioavailability of oral hormonal supplements can vary widely. The saliva test can also help you evaluate if estrogens are well balanced with progesterone following progesterone cream supplementation. Too much estrogen, relative to progesterone, leads to excessive tissue proliferation, whereas too much progesterone in the absence of adequate estrogen can exacerbate estrogen deficiency problems.

Saliva hormone testing can also be vital for rational disease prevention and anti-aging programs. Testosterone, for example, is an important hormone in both sexes, for the maintenance of cardiovascular and bone health.

Identification of a low testosterone level and correction with diet, exercise, and/or hormone supplementation could help prevent the development of cardiovascular disease and osteoporosis.

We MUST have the following info on you... so please put this info in the "comments" section of the ordering process: 1. Date of Birth 2. Date of last menstrual cycle 3. Hysterectomy? 4. If so when? 5. Height? 6. Weight? 7. What medications are you currently on? 8. What hormones are you currently taking?

SALIVA REFLECTS THE BIOAVAILABLE CONCENTRATION OF HORMONES PRESENT IN THE BLOODSTREAM

We get asked the question all the time about why we offer saliva testing for hormones instead of blood testing... many of our clients have gone to their local doctor's office and been told that saliva testing is not accurate and that blood testing is the only way to go... this is simply not true... so I'm g oing to try to clear up why this is so and help you to understand that difference between the two methods.... it's going to be a bit technical so please use a dictionary if there are any words you do not fully understand as you read this... Blood is a fluid consisting of red and white cells suspended in an aqueous plasma. The cells make up about 45 percent of the mixture (called the "hematocrit"), and the watery plasma is about 55 percent of the mixture. The majority of cells in the blood are red blood cells (erythrocytes). The most important constituent of the red blood cell is hemoglobin whose main function is to transport oxygen from the lungs to the somatic (body) cells. The other cells in blood are white blood cells (leukocytes) that include platelets. The white blood cells are nearly twice the size of red blood cells and are concerned with immunity.

For example, the white cells can engulf bacteria and foreign particles in a process called "phagocytosis."

The platelets function to control bleeding after an injury. The platelets liberate serotonin when the blood vessels are damaged. This causes small blood vessels (capillaries) to strongly contract, which reduces bleeding.The blood also contains fibrinogen and other factors that cause blood to clot.

When blood is drawn from a vein (low pressure going to the heart), it contains plasma and red and white blood cells. To analyze the blood, the plasma is separated from the blood cells by centrifugation. Since the plasma still contains clotting factors, an anticoagulant is added. This, then, is the plasma used for blood analysis. If the blood is allowed to coagulate, the cell-depleted fluid phase, devoid of fibrinogen, is called "serum." The serum may also be used for analysis. In either case, the blood being analyzed does not contain the red blood cells that held the free testosterone. What is being analyzed is testosterone that is attached to binding proteins and is not bioavailable.

When testosterone (or any other natural bio-identical hormone) is applied transdermally, it is absorbed into the bloodstream as "free" testosterone. It has not been packaged with a binding protein by the liver because the liver did not have access to the testosterone. Most of the "free" testosterone is taken up by the red blood cell membranes which are not analyzed by a common blood test. Conclusion: Common blood tests that use plasma or serum are not accurate for assessing bioavailable steroid hormone concentrations because neither the plasma nor the serum contain the red blood cells which hold the bioavailable hormones.

Now for some background on saliva. There are three salivary glands in the mouth that produce about two pints of saliva per day. The saliva is about 99.5% water and 0.5% solute. Saliva is used for chewing, swallowing and the initiation of digestion by the enzyme amylase which begins the breakdown of carbohydrates. In addition, saliva is protective against pathogens ( a micro-organism or substance capable of producing disease). It is antibacterial, antifungal and antiviral. That's probably why rubbing saliva on an injury feels so good. Saliva also contains immunoglobulin A which protects the eyes, nose, throat, intestines and lungs from infectious diseases. (bet you didn't know that about saliva?!)

The secretion of saliva is entirely under the control of the nervous system. Sympathetic nervous system stimulation dominates during stress, resulting in dryness of the mouth. During dehydration, the salivary glands stop secreting to conserve water, and the resulting dryness in the mouth contributes to the sensation of thirst.

The salivary glands have an extremely high blood flow which is about ten times that of an equal mass of contracting skeletal muscle. Researchers have found that the "free" hormones from the red blood cells and plasma readily filter through the saliva glands into saliva where they can be measured accurately ( in parts per trillion).

Conclusion: Saliva reflects the bioavailable level of hormones present in the bloodstream, and saliva testing is a far more accurate and relevant test than blood tests in measuring bioavailable steroid hormones such as estrogens, progesterone, testosterone, DHEAS and cortisol.

Whew! I hope you didn't go to sleep with all of that... now you actually have something to show your doctor if he/she questions you about why you chose saliva testing for your hormone levels. I hope this also gives you more certainty on why you NEED to get your hormones checked properly with saliva testing.

The other point that should be made is accurate reading and interpretation of the saliva test results must occur. The main point to make is that just looking at whether or not a particular hormone is "in range" is simply not an accurate assessment... a practitioner should also check on the balance bewteen the two partner hormones (such as progesterone and estradiol)...or the relationship of one hormone to another (such as DHEAS and cortisol).

Let's look at the following sample results to give you the idea... Example: Estradiol: 4.5 (range is 1- 5) ; Progesterone: 520 (range is 500 - 3000) *The above individual is IN RANGE but IMBALANCED... how do I know that... the ratio/balance for her is 115 and the range is 200-1000. This individual is IMBALANCED even though IN RANGE....(divide the progesterone figure by the estrogen figure to get the ratio number). (women may need 5 to 10 times more progesterone than estrogen). Now in the above example this particular woman may not need tons of progesterone but she certainly needs some in order to achieve a healthy balance.

New research by Brent Formby, Ph.D. at the Sansum MedicalResearch Institute in Santa Barbara, CA has uncovered evidence that progesterone may help men with prostate problems. His results showed that progesterone inhibits the growth of prostate cancer cells and that estradiol (estrogen) and dihdrotestosterone (DHT) (bad testosterone) accelerate prostate cancer cell growth. So if this is true, why aren't doctors prescribing natural progesterone to their patients? The answers are money and lack of knowledge. First money, truly natural progesterone, one that is the same chemical composition that our bodies make can not be patented. You can not patent a natural occurring substance. If you can't patent it, you can't make money. Secondly doctors remain cautious and wary of a drug that doesn't show up in their medical literature, and does not appear to have any credibility behind it. It is a vicious circle, if a substance can not be patented, there is no money to be made, then if there is no money to be made, and then there is no reason for a drug company to do a clinical trial to see if the substance is beneficial.

Each year over 400,000 men in the United States alone undergo prostate surgery and over a billion dollars a year is spent on prostate treatment. Proscar, the leading drug is highly dangerous and according to the United States Veteran's Administration is no more effective than a sugar pill. On the opposite side there are no side effects to using natural progesterone. By the age of 50, 35% of men have cancer cells in their prostate. Odds are 2 to 1 a man will have prostate problems by the time they are 60. Get your husband to get tested NOW with an accurate saliva test!

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