Edwin Plewes, 50 years old, Grande Prairie, AB Canada

I am Edwin Plewes, of Grande Prairie, AB, in western Canada. I am currently 50 years old. I am fit, active, and generally of good health. I work in the gas and oil industry with a mobile welding truck. My difficulties started taking me to doctors a couple of years ago when I began falling asleep during the day. It reached the point where it was, at times, not safe to drive. I looked terrible so said my friends and coworkers. They kept asking what was wrong. I was losing weight, had no appetite, would get sick to stomach if tried to force myself to eat more. I could barely function sexually, even with Viagra. I blamed the problems on Paxil, and anti-depressant I had been on for a dozen years. But to see a specialist to change the medication would take four months. Welcome to universal public healthcare! At a friend’s encouragement, I tried testosterone injections, which helped immensely. I got the medication changed and the energy improved greatly again, but the other symptoms persisted.

Edwin Plewes, testosterone injections

A couple of doctors suggested hormone testing. In June/11 I went off the injections, and a month later was falling asleep again and going downhill. Got test results back in August from family doctor. Tested in the 300’s. Bingo! That’s the problem. To my dismay the doctor said this was normal and treatment for hormones was mostly a myth with no benefit. Was run out of his office for asking questions! A hormone pharmacist suggested another doctor. Results were the same. Hormone treatment is just not part of the Canadian medical thinking. Pharmacist suggested an anti-aging doctor. None in my area. Went back on injections to keep going and looked into medical tourism in CR as I already had tickets for end of October/11. Found COSTA HGH & TESTOSTERONE CLINIC and set up appointment for 9:00 am.

Went in. Was told by Dr. Karna Meenavalli that I had the five major signs of andropause, or male menopause. At 3:30pm, on the same day, not three months later as is the case in Canada, I got the results with the most comprehensive blood analysis report I, or any pharmacist at home who saw it, have ever seen. Testosterone and DHEA were too low and estrogen was way too high. Left same day with the testosterone implants and DHEA supplements plus drug prescription to bring down estrogen levels. In two weeks I was sleeping normally again, appetite was back, energy was back. In two months, I did not need Viagra to function, and my overall health was as if I was 30 years old again. Anti-depressant meds were gone and a thing of the past. Sadly, a couple of permanent side effects from long term use remain, but they are livable with. My next trip down in December will be just after a year from starting treatment. Overall health is good, the weight has come back, Viagra and antidepressants are not needed, and, in a physically demanding environment, I keep up with workers many years younger.

All of this happiness cost me about the same amount of money for private health care as it costs me in lost income to shut down my welding truck for the morning and go to my family doctor. The one that believes my dramatic improvement in well being is just a myth. To get to see a specialist of Dr. Karna Meenavalli’s capacity, because so few exist in Canada, could take up to 30 months. And only if you can find a family doctor that can be convinced anything is wrong, so as to get the necessary referrals, which I was unable to do. In Canada, we are 10 to 20 years behind cutting edge medical breakthroughs…and in the remote area I live in…the doctors are much further behind. I have asked several pharmacists in Canada about the treatment program but none have heard of the program combination I am on. This is the not so good side of our universal public health system. In reality, we all get the same dismal level of poor. As well, I can see that, as some Canadian pharmacists have told me, if everyone had their hormones balanced, starting in their 40’s, they would consume well under half the prescription medications that they will typically use over the second half of their lives. And they would live immensely better. Definitely the pharmaceutical industry is opposed to good health that reduces the need for their drugs.

Sadly, in Canada, what was once a state of the art health care system, is now so overloaded by an aging unhealthy population that I estimate the number of Canadians flying to Asia, Central America, and India to buy private health care exceeds the million mark. I get my dental, optometry, and most of my doctor care in Costa Rica now. I expect I will do so for the next 30 plus years. At least in northern AB where I live, the cost, the service, and the results for ordinary day to day health care are vastly superior in Costa Rica. It is cheap to get there and beautiful when you do.

I have friends with the same symptoms I had. And the same assessment from their doctors that all is normal. Well, people, that ‘normal’ might be enough to stay alive, but it is not enough to live normally. The solution exists in the treatment Dr. Karna Meenavalli provides. It is readily available to many Canadians. All we have to do is get on the plane and go get it……and start living again!

Edwin Plewes
Grande Prairie, AB Canada