TRT Advice Needed

[slicwilly2000]

I saw the urologist today for the first time. She was very different than anyone I have seen thus far. She came across as very willing to actually prescribe which was incredibly comforting. She started off saying that she doesn't like to prescribe the cream because it's very expensive. I guess that office can't do the pellets either. She said she likes to prescribe Test Cypionate and recommended biweekly injections at 200mg per two weeks. I asked her if she knew what the half life is on the cypionate ester which she didn't immediately come up with an answer for so I answered the question myself and told her the half life is 5 to 7 days so best case scenario you have 25% of it in your blood on day 14. I suggested we do weekly injections instead. She agreed to that. Then she asked if I wanted to come into the office once a week for injections or if I would like to have a friend do it. I said I could probably do it myself. We discussed what kind of levels she was looking for and her response was very broad. She said it's more how you feel and not so much what the numbers were. She had no issue maintaining above 800. She said she doesn't like to go above 1000. Then I asked about HCG to see if she would prescribe that as well. She was agreeable and recommended clomid and arimidex to deal with the estrogen. She gave me an order for more labs to be done. She said the insurance needed two sets of bloodwork in order to pay for it. She said she is still willing to prescribe even if the insurance doesn't deem the levels low enough to cover it.

Does anyone have any advice on what else to ask for in the future? I was trying to come across as knowledgeable on what I was looking for but not quite as far as what they would call a "seeker" which is what some of the nurses at other doctors offices have said when I tried to get it dealt with before. For that reason I didn't ask for the injectable up front. I had planned to object to the pellets but thought she would insist on the cream for a few months before moving over to the injectable. Her objection on the cream was that it was very expensive and insurance companies don't like to pay for it.

Slic.

 

[Lizard King]

She probably saw your little pee pee and felt bad for you.
Sounds like you have a good doc so far. Isnt Test U legal in the US now? May want to opt for that if you are looking for less frequent injections.

 

[slicwilly2000]

I have no idea. I don't really care about injection frequency. I've been having blood drawn at least once a month for the last 15 years. I feel very little when they draw blood whether it's from the arm or hand or wherever. In addition to that I had acupuncture for about 2 years and the only place I felt it was when they put it in the achilles tendon. The rest of the acupuncture points I barely noticed.

Slic.

 

[rawdeal]

. . . . Isnt Test U legal in the US now? May want to opt for that if you are looking for less frequent injections.

Available in the USA as Aveed. Nebido is another brand name.

Patient Home

Learn about AVEED® (testosterone undecanoate) injection CIII. See Safety Information, including Boxed Warning, benefits and risks, and full Prescribing Information.

www.aveedusa.com

The drug company suggests what most of us might consider a weird injection schedule, essentially frontloading an assload (couldn't resist) of the stuff with one huge shot before leveling off to smaller, infrequent, shots ... blood work along the way and some dose-tweaking by the doctor is assumed.

There have been a few references to the usefulness of Test U right here at Lizard's Playhouse. Sounds like slic found a gem of a doctor, that she might be willing to prescribe Aveed instead of Cyp. Getting her to switch to what we would call a more normal injection schedule instead of the company's recommendation is a different matter(?) The earlier Test U discussions here usually describe DIY use from ugls for trt or maybe a light cruise, accompanied by a DIY injection schedule. Not hard to find on ugl lists as long as you trust the ugl. There's a few I know + trust, but I can see the advantages of acquiring a doctor's script along with some ugl stuff.

 

[MrRippedZilla]

I've been on Nebido (UK version) for 5 years. 1g into the glute every 10-11 weeks keeps me in the 900-500ng/dl range. I know it's easy to look at the injection schedule on paper and question it, but based on experience - it's about right. Unless you're looking for stable levels, in which case you'd have to mess around a bit. Not something I ever cared about for TRT.

In terms of Nebido/Aveed vs Cyp - both work fine. Aveed is better for long-term adherence, Cyp is better if you feel the need to come off for whatever reason in the future, etc - comes down to personal preference.

 

[genetic freak]

Sounds like your visit went about as well as you could hope for. I honestly cannot think of anything else you could ask other than is she just going to be looking at your hormone levels or she looking at everything else when she takes blood. My doctor threatens to lower or take me off TRT if my RBC, HCT, creatin, etc.. are above normal. It is a problem for me, because I am borderline high RBC and HCT even when I am not on anything. I have to plan my cycles to stop a couple months prior to get everything as low as possible when I see him once a year for bloodwork (I have been on TRT for a while now, so only go in once a year for blood if there are no concerns).

 

[JackD]

I honestly don’t have anything else you have to ask. Your Dr seems like a gem and one I would go see. Eventually you could bring up the Test U down the road as an alternative. I know that for long term that seems the better way to go. This is very exciting! Good luck!

 

[kid666]

Shes sounds like a definite keeper. Docs usually aren't too fond of a patient who is spouting off knowledge and facts on TRT above the knowledge the doctor possess themselves. Personally, I'm always a little too tight lipped, as to not seem like a "seeker". I think you did amazing!! I love the part where you told her i can probably do the injections myself. That was a very nice way of saying "lady, I've been injecting myself since you were in preschool." lol

 

[rawdeal]

The hidden bonus here is that DRE's are a common sense fact of life for older males and that a female doctor is likely to have smaller hands. I had a female Urologist once AND she was Asian too! I woulda had weekly DREs if my insurance (and the doctor) hadn't balked.

 

[slicwilly2000]

She said that if RBC gets too high she'll have blood drawn to bring it down. I went into this appointment with the belief that it was probable she would do nothing. My intention was to just buy it off the internet and do it myself. The thing I did different this time than every previous time is I had 8 months of training on using skilled questions to sell. Once I knew she was willing to treat I decided to see how far I could push it. I used questions to get her to say what I wanted her to say. I've got about $10k invested in sales training at this point. It's somewhat expensive but I can say the techniques actually work. I used a bunch of questions to see what she was wiling to do and how she wanted to do it. The rest was just pointing out flaws in her logic and getting her to tell herself those flaws. But yes normally I would agree that you look like a seeker if you do that. I've been accused of that many times before. I don't have a ton of knowledge on the RBC stuff. I get the basics but not in detail. When she brought that up I simply asked her in her training how would she treat it and said yeah that sounds good let's do that. The idea here was for her to feel like these were her ideas and this was her plan of how she wanted to do it. I always do this with my psychiatrist every visit just to make the visits more interesting so I can actually stay awake and engaged. The psychiatrist always goes off on these tangents to prescribe some new drug and then I use the right questions to sell herself on not doing it. If I tell her no I'm not taking yet more drugs it doesn't go over well.

Slic.

 

[slicwilly2000]

What I was curious if there is anything else I should consider researching that she could prescribe in the future. I don't know if there is anything else they typically do with TRT or can be done with TRT to achieve some result. I haven't read anything but this is not my area of expertise so I decided to ask here. I don't know much about TRT protocols to know why it's done down to the scientific detail.

Slic.

 

[jawbreaker24]

Man you hit the jack pot! Lucky you. Every doctor I’ve asked about act like I am asking for herion.


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