Welcome to the TRT and Hormone Optimization YouTube channel. My name is Steven De Vos and I have as a guest today back here Gil T. Welcome Gil. Thank you very much. So Gil, today we want to talk about something very basic.
Many men starting TRT have hard times to grasp the basic concepts and medical terminology about dosage calculations, milligrams versus milliliters versus units in an insulin syringe, etc. Can you please... Clarify this a bit.
And also, can you also explain how to convert between the different lab measurement units? Like for testosterone and estrogen, people have a hard time understanding nanograms per deciliter in the United States and in some laboratories here. And often here in Europe, nanomoles per liter are used. So clarify all this. This is the TRT and Hormone Optimization YouTube channel.
If you want to learn all about the science-based information on this topic, consider subscribing, hit that notification bell, and you'll be on your way. Sure. So for starters, before we even get into units of measure in terms of different regions, you have to first understand the differences in what they actually mean. Oftentimes we'll ask someone for a dose and when you ask them for a dose they'll say, well I inject a cc or I inject a 0.5. Those aren't doses, those are volumes and it's very important to differentiate between mass and volume because volume just tells you how much of a product in terms of volume in the syringe or in a vial actually exists.
To understand how much medication is actually in that volume of product. we have to look at the concentration strength. And the concentration is measured in mass per volume.
So milligrams, or anything that you can essentially convert into weight on a scale, grams, milligrams, micrograms, etc., are essentially mass, and that is the dose of the medication. And then that is then mixed into a fluid generally, or a liquid, in most cases, oil or water. and that gives you the volume. So the concentration is how much mass is in volume. So if we look at testosterone cypionate, which is the most common form used in the United States, presumably where you have your largest audience of viewers, for simplicity, let's just say pharmaceutical grade cypionate in the U.S. is generally concentrated at 200 milligrams per milliliter.
This means that for every milliliter of fluid, okay, which is generally in a carrier oil, Combined with everything else, in every milliliter of volume, we have 200 milligrams of actual testosterone. Now, this is testosterone combined with an ester. So we're not going to get into the breakdown of molecular weight of esters versus hormone and what ratio that is. But let's just simplify it as 200 milligrams of actual testosterone in every one milliliter of carrier oil. So when you say I inject 1 cc, which, by the way, equals 1 ml.
They're interchangeable with a cubic centimeter and a milliliter or one in the same. One cc or one ml of testosterone cypionate, presumably if your concentration is 200 milligrams per ml, contains 200 milligrams. Therefore, half of an ml contains 100 milligrams. 0.25 or a quarter of an ml contains 50 milligrams. So divide the milligrams by the ratio of breaking down the volume.
So when someone says, what is your dose? The answer should be 50 milligrams or 80 milligrams or 100 milligrams, not half of an ml. That is not a dose.
That is just volume. Okay. So that's to differentiate between mass versus volume. You got to look at the concentration. When it comes down to actually measuring units, an insulin syringe, which I know we are big proponents of with regards to injections, insulin syringes generally come in 100 units or 50-unit or in some cases 30-unit applications.
Generally speaking, the 27 to 29-gauge syringes that we advocate for testosterone come in 100-unit syringes. 100 units equals 1 ml, so it's really nice and easy. 25 units is a quarter of an ml, 50 units is a half of an ml, and 100 units is a full ml. So when your dose says to draw and inject... you know, 30 units or 0.3 of an ml.
They're interchangeable, 30 units. So oftentimes we'll see guys come on a forum and they'll say, you know, how much on this syringe do I draw if this is my dose? So again, this should be a fairly simple way to convert. In terms of different laboratories in different countries or regions of the world using different measurement units, yes. Before we continue, if you appreciate the content we bring to this channel, check out the Amazon links in the description of this video.
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All links should work on the US, Canadian, and UK Amazon stores. The simplest way, and I hate to oversimplify this, but the simplest way to do the conversion is go into Google and type in the unit of measurement that you're looking to... read off the lab and then the one you want to convert it.
And Google has a great calculator that will actually give you the conversion ratio of one, two. So for example, we know that nanograms per deciliter equals a 10 to one ratio or a one to 10 ratio of picograms per milliliter. So when something is reported at picograms per milliliter, you divide by 10 to get nanograms per deciliter. Again, lab values are essentially reported in concentration. This is mass per volume.
A deciliter is a volume, right? A nanogram is a mass. So this is how many nanograms mass are in one deciliter.
A picogram per milliliter. These are concentrations. So you have to do the conversion and the best way to do it is using a Google calculator.
Essentially, it's not that complicated. This is literally all it comes down to. This is just math. So if you step back and look at what units you're dealing with and simplify it, you can kind of get a better understanding of exactly what's going on.
I would like to touch on the fact that LabCorp, and we say this all the time, but for those that don't know, actually report your free testosterone in nanograms per deciliter. However, on their lab, it'll say picograms per milliliter. And that is incorrect. It is an error that's been...
brought up to their attention many times over the years by many different providers and they for some reason refuse to fix this error but they are the only ones that i've seen and any lab that uses lab core for their specimen analysis will generally report back the same way so that is an error that many in this industry are aware of and many are not aware of okay thank you gil i hope this clarifies things and now give this video a thumbs up And go watch one of these videos to learn a ton more about TRT and hormone optimization.