The Third Body

Today's lesson is about the body and what doctors look for in all that blood that you give.

Tests looking at levels of the following are part of the metabolic panel and provide information about the patients liver:

Alkaline phosphatase: An enzyme that removes the phosphate group from various proteins in your body. It is ubiquitous but mostly concentrated in liver, bile duct, kidney and placenta. Abnormal levels can indicate a disease state.

Gamma glutamyl transferase: Transfers amino acids across a cellular membrane and is also involved in glutathione metabolism. Found in liver, bile duct and kidney. Deviation from the norm indicates an abnormality in the liver. By the way glutathione is a nonessential (can be synthesized in the body from other substrates) nutrient that is used by the liver.

AST and ALT: Aspartate and Alanine Transaminase. Both enzymes are used by the liver to transfer amino acids.

Metal poisoning can cause a variety of condition. The following metals are usually tested when abnormally high levels of metals are suspected.

Hg - mercury, Ti - titanium, Cd - cadmium, Fe - iron. If you have a high level of any of these metals, you can use a chelating agent to bind the atoms and flush them out of your body. Tetracycline antibiotics are commonly used to bind metals. Another common chelating agent is EDTA (Ethylene diamine tetracetic acid).

A joke at every end:

A pirate walks into a bar with a steering wheel on his crotch.
He sits down and orders a beer.
The bartender pours the beer and asks
"Pirate, what's going on, why is there a wheel on your crotch?"
The pirate says
"Arrrrr, it's driving me nuts."