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Today I would like to talk about DHEA or it's also known as dehydroepiandrosterone. DHEA
is the building block for all of your steroid hormones, your sex hormones in your body,
progesterone, estrogen, testosterone. DHEA supports the adrenal gland and is important
in energy functions, metabolism. It increases insulin sensitivity which reduces the need
for insulin which also helps counteract diabetes. It functions with memory, it helps with weight
loss, it's extremely important. Women will convert a little bit of DHEA to testosterone.
In males, we don't get much conversion to testosterone at all. One of the problems with
supplementing DHEA is that the quality of the DHEA over the counter products is not
good. You really want to have a time release product that you can take once a day, which
is generally going to come from a compounding pharmacy or is a higher grade over the counter
product available through fewer suppliers. If you just pick up some DHEA at one of the
local pharmacies, the over the counter DHEA you will probably need to take 2 to 3 times
a day to establish a good relationship and a good level. Your DHEA level, the DHEAS level
needs to be checked prior to starting therapy, and then as therapy proceeds to monitor and
make sure that you're getting adequate levels. The doses can vary greatly. A lot of women
start at 5 or 10 milligrams, but may need up to 25 to 50 milligrams. Males generally
start around 25 milligrams, but may need up to 75 to 100 milligrams daily in order to
achieve adequate DHEA levels. DHEA is vitally important and is one more piece to the hormone
puzzle. If you feel like your having symptoms that could be compatible with low DHEA which
are fatigue, memory issues, weight issues, insulin issues, then I would like you to call
my office and schedule an appointment. I am Dr. David Jayne at 405-330-0038.