Understanding Your Blood Work: 4 Important Levels to Monitor for Health

Functional medicine is a form of medicine that views the body as one whole, integrated system.

Unlike conventional Western medicine, which divides the body up into multiple systems, functional medicine looks at how these systems relate to one another.

While functional medicine excels at treating chronic disorders, it is also used in preventative care.

How to Read Functional Lab Work

While conventional medicine primarily uses lab data for diagnosis, functional medicine will view the entire spectrum of a disorder to both prevent and treat disease.

Leona West, a certified nutritionist, herbalist, fitness trainer, and birth doula working at Santa Monica Wellness Group specializes in reading blood work from a functional standpoint. She explains that functional lab ranges generally run wider or tighter than conventional labs. This is because functional medicine looks at the entire spectrum of a disorder, making it easier to prevent and treat disease.

Conventional medicine, on the other hand, uses lab data for diagnosis alone. While diagnosis is valuable, all the deficiencies and steps leading up to a disorder are often overlooked.

Here are some key things to look for on your next lab panel:

1. Iron

Leona explains that for women, the most common thing that you will see out of range is iron.

Severely low iron is what is known as anemia. Even borderline low levels of iron can contribute to many of the symptoms related to anemia.

Low energy is one of the most common signs that iron levels are not where they should be. Another common sign is frequent bouts of the flu.

If you are interested in strengthening your iron levels, skip the traditional iron supplements in the supermarket. Otherwise known as ferrous sulfate, these supplements are notorious for causing constipation.

Leona especially cautions against men taking an iron supplement. Unlike women in their childbearing years who bleed every month, men have no outlet if their iron levels rise too high.

Foods that enhance iron levels in the body include:

• The darker and greener the vegetable, the better. Think of sturdy greens like kale and spinach.
• Microalgae are functional foods that can therapeutically build iron levels in the body. A good example of iron-rich microalgae is Spirulina. The most absorbable form of Spirulina is fermented Super Spirulina Plus.
• Seaweeds are an excellent source of iron. Leona recommends placing a large strip of kombu in soup as it cooks. Ocean vegetables are also available in powder or capsule form like Ocean Plant Extract.
• Nettle, which you can easily brew as sun tea, is an excellent source of iron.

2. Vitamin D

Leona explains that, “We usually hear it a lot in terms of bone health, but vitamin D is very critical for the immune system.”

People who have low levels of vitamin D are more susceptible to infection. When vitamin D levels drop below 50, you are more likely to fall ill. Besides evading the common cold and flu, vitamin D dramatically impacts the body’s ability to fend off cancer, in particular breast cancer.

Vitamin D is regulated by the sun. During fall and winter, when we get less sun exposure, vitamin D levels naturally drop.

If that’s not reason enough to get your vitamin D levels checked this fall, according to Leona, seven out of 10 of her patients do not have optimal levels of vitamin D.

While vitamin D deficiency is common, Leona recommends that you first run a panel and check vitamin D levels before taking a supplement that offers anything higher than 2,000 iu (international units).

If you want to bring vitamin D levels up, try to:

• Find opportunities to spend time in the sun.
• Gravitate toward those foods that are richest in vitamin D, such as eggs, fish, and grass-fed butter.
• Switch over to cod liver oil if you are already taking an omega-3 supplement. Cod liver oil contains high levels of naturally occurring vitamin D and is a great overall tonic for the immune system.

3. WBC, or White Blood Cells

White blood cell count is something else that your physician may look at. White blood cells, or leukocytes, defend the body against infection, disease-causing bugs, and foreign material.

The optimal and functional range is wider than the conventional model, somewhere between 5 or 8.

If your WBC falls under 5, this can indicate that your immune system is weak. This could be due to stress, underlying infections, or low levels of flora.

In this case, Leona recommends:

• Probiotics. Just by increasing beneficial bacteria, you are going to make an immediate impact on your white blood cells. The best sources of probiotics are fermented foods and probiotic beverages.
• Vitamin C. Vitamin C can lower oxidative stress. Inflammation makes you more vulnerable to infection. If you want to take a vitamin C supplement, find a whole food supplement like acerola cherry, camu camu, or amla fruit.
• Medicinal mushrooms, especially maitake. When taking medicinal mushrooms, it is important to get an extract. The extraction process activates the essential immune modulators in mushroom, such as beta-glucans.

4. TSH, or Thyroid-Stimulating Hormone

An easy way to check immune function is to look at TSH levels. This is especially true if you have a history of an underactive thyroid or a family history of hypothyroidism.

Because hypothyroidism affects the immune system and regulated metabolic function, it is a good idea to check the thyroid if you find that you are especially susceptible to infection.

In order to determine the health of your thyroid, a physician will look at TSH levels in the blood. The functional range for TSH, which is 1.8-3, is much higher than the conventional laboratory range.

If your thyroid is underactive, you may want to consider:

• Get a little (or a lot) more vitamin D in your diet. It turns out that the thyroid responds to vitamin D levels in the body. One easy way to give your thyroid a boost is make sure your vitamin D levels are high.
• Incorporate sea vegetables and Ocean Plant Extract. Besides boosting iron levels, seaweed supports a healthy thyroid.