Post: #1

Anyone ever do a Executive Health Exam? Its a full day of body exams

Thorough medical history evaluation
Thorough physical exam
General bloodwork incl. Advanced lab screening
Urinalysis
Chest X-Ray
EKG
Nuclear or standard stress test
Full Body or Heart CAT Scan
Holter Monitor
General and cardiac ultrasound (CIMT Testing)
Pulmonary function testing
Nutritional Counseling

and some other stuff. Is 30 too young to be doing this? Ive never been admitted to a hospital before, dont smoke, not over weight but always good to be proactive.

Post: #2

I've gotten blood work done since my 20s.

Do testosterone and other hormone levels (dhea, estrodiol, progesterone, etc.), vitamin d levels.

You want to monitor how your blood/body is changing over time.

The rest of that stuff is for executive aged guys, ie in their 50s.

But if you have good insurance, get whatever test your doctor will authorize.

Post: #3

I have always wanted to have some sort of thorough, full body test panel done for various cancers. So many people die from it, including my dad and my cousins wife who was only 22, that I sketch out on it. I would gladly pay to have a doctor who knows what the fuck he is doing run a bunch of tests and scans to check me out. Paranoid about it maybe, but cancer is some scary shit.

Post: #4

(09-21-2012 01:59 PM)chyamor Wrote:  Anyone ever do a Executive Health Exam? Its a full day of body exams

Thorough medical history evaluation
Thorough physical exam
General bloodwork incl. Advanced lab screening
Urinalysis
Chest X-Ray
EKG
Nuclear or standard stress test
Full Body or Heart CAT Scan
Holter Monitor
General and cardiac ultrasound (CIMT Testing)
Pulmonary function testing
Nutritional Counseling

and some other stuff. Is 30 too young to be doing this? Ive never been admitted to a hospital before, dont smoke, not over weight but always good to be proactive.

As my epidemiology professor back in school said: 'The validity of a test is decreased in the absence of disease'
In plain English, if you're not feeling sick, a medical test may turn out positive for illness when there is nothing to treat.

Most medical tests are standardised to a p value of 0.05, in other words all tests are 95% accurate in the presence of disease. Even under ideal conditions, this means that a medical test has a 5% failure rate. Without the disease present, the accuracy of some tests goes down even lower, meaning you can test positive for a disease you don't have.

Compare this to the engineering disciplines who work to a p value of 0.001 or even up to 0.0001. What that means: if an engineer builds a bridge to a value of 0.0001, then there is only a 0.01% chance of the bridge ever spontaneously collapsing. The guys who build bridges are more concerned about the certainty of your health than medical doctors are.

I'm not good enough at statistics to explain it better than that, it's got to do with the way medical tests are designed in the first place. There is no real test for 'healthiness', meaning you are subjecting yourself to testing for 'diseases' and can thus test false-positive for a disease you don't have.

That said, there are good guidelines available for reliable preventative medicine screening tests, with a low likelihood of false positives:

go to this website:
http://epss.ahrq.gov/ePSS/search.jsp

Fill in your age, gender, smoking background, sexual background.

click 'show recommendations'

print out the recommendations

take it to your doctor, and ask your doctor for a general checkup and to assess your health according to the printout, with specific emphasis on A and B grade recommendations.

Word of warning: a decent checkup should take at least 30 minutes, including history, examination, recommendations for further action; if your doctor is unwilling to book you for that long, then find one who is willing.

Post: #5

(09-21-2012 02:02 PM)MikeCF Wrote:  Do testosterone and other hormone levels (dhea, estrodiol, progesterone, etc.), vitamin d levels.

The Vitamin D test is inaccurate, but the laboratories are happy to make money whichever way they can so they've hyped it up quiet a bit. The vitamin D test is based more on marketing than on science.

It can be useful aid to diagnosis in some circumstances, I don't want to be too hard on it. But you need to be careful in interpreting it.

The last chemical pathology article on this subject that I skimmed admitted a 20% variance in results between labs. That's a hell of a lot of variance.

Post: #6

(09-23-2012 01:48 AM)Thomas the Rhymer Wrote:  As my epidemiology professor back in school said: 'The validity of a test is decreased in the absence of disease'
In plain English, if you're not feeling sick, a medical test may turn out positive for illness when there is nothing to treat.

Most medical tests are standardised to a p value of 0.05, in other words all tests are 95% accurate in the presence of disease. Even under ideal conditions, this means that a medical test has a 5% failure rate. Without the disease present, the accuracy of some tests goes down even lower, meaning you can test positive for a disease you don't have.

Compare this to the engineering disciplines who work to a p value of 0.001 or even up to 0.0001. What that means: if an engineer builds a bridge to a value of 0.0001, then there is only a 0.01% chance of the bridge ever spontaneously collapsing. The guys who build bridges are more concerned about the certainty of your health than medical doctors are.

I'm not good enough at statistics to explain it better than that, it's got to do with the way medical tests are designed in the first place. There is no real test for 'healthiness', meaning you are subjecting yourself to testing for 'diseases' and can thus test false-positive for a disease you don't have.

That said, there are good guidelines available for reliable preventative medicine screening tests, with a low likelihood of false positives:

go to this website:
http://epss.ahrq.gov/ePSS/search.jsp

Fill in your age, gender, smoking background, sexual background.

click 'show recommendations'

print out the recommendations

take it to your doctor, and ask your doctor for a general checkup and to assess your health according to the printout, with specific emphasis on A and B grade recommendations.

Word of warning: a decent checkup should take at least 30 minutes, including history, examination, recommendations for further action; if your doctor is unwilling to book you for that long, then find one who is willing.

Interesting perspective. Why do you think most tests are designed like that? I think it would be awesome if there WERE a test for "healthiness". Though I suppose it would bring out every hypochondriac as well.

The ideal would be if a GP could run a battery of tests, and then give solid lifestyle and other recommendations based on the outcomes. From what you're saying a lot of tests run now for purely preventative reasons are unreliable and can give false positives.

Post: #7

I just had much of this done and an "all good" on everything. Felt great as I'd not had a physical in 10 years. Get it done!

Post: #8

I was thinking of doing something like this. But then I usually get some kind of symptoms every now and then. Every week/month it's something different. If it's not headache, it's shoulder or back that's troubling me, or skin, an STD scare, or respiratory systems etc. I've realised that if I were to go to a doctor every time something comes up I really will never live a life troublefree. I'm a hypochondriac though have had some real helth problems but nothing life-threatening really. I think if I get a symptom and it get continually worse I might go see a doctor but right now I'm just so sick of going to the doctor every other week. Like Roosh has written recently we're all going to die at some point anyway and constantly worrying and examining your health takes a lot of energy (and not to mention money) from enjoying life and gaming chicks. Also, worrying too much about your health can make you sick for real.