I think the criticism should be directed toward the current TRT clinical guidelines, more than this guy or his current doctor.
I've watched a lot of his videos before discovering
ExcelMale. Let's realize, Bignoknow's father is a pediatrician, and also makes very informative YouTube videos (filmed by his son.)
https://www.youtube.com/user/paulthomasmd
His father has 113K subscribers. Bignoknow has 31K subscribers.
Bignoknow's YouTube channel is basically a documentary of his personal struggle with depression/anxiety, and realization that he was hypogonadal. His 1st video was 4/25/2012, and he has come a long way since then.
He has only been with Dr. Erica Zelfand for the last year of so. His original doctor never checked his FSH or LH prior to putting him on TRT. And after years of TRT, Dr. Zelfand suspected he was originally misdiagnosed as primary hypogonadism, as opposed to secondary. Here is their first video together (3/24/15).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK81LOPNKG0
Video (4/9/15) with his dad discussing new diagnosis of hypothyroid with TSH of 4.8. 2012 clinical guidelines suggest TSH of 10.0 or above should be treated, but below 10.0 is questionable. Again the clinical guidelines suck.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8wKiwzRvZw
Note, I was diagnosed with high TSH in 2006 (TSH 3.8), and had ED issues since 2000, which low dose Viagra solved. I had Testosterone checked in 2000 (no #s, but "your normal"), 2012 (TT 351, FT 51, and told you are close, but still normal). Finally in 2015 (341 and for the first time a doctor finally checked LH & FSH which were both very high.)
Again - who's fault are my years of not being diagnosed? I blame it on the clinical guidelines. Does this mean Dr. Zelfand is perfect? No, but she's not a TRT specialist either. These doctors from
Defy & Prime Body have 100x experience treating patients like us.
I have a lot of respect for Dr. Erica Zelfand, Dr. Paul Thomas, and Bignoknow for sharing the knowledge the do have. I think we should invite them to participate with
ExcelMale, Prime Body &
Defy to learn more. We are all on a journey of learning.