C-Reactive Protein- Quantitative (qCRP)

C-reactive protein is a substance commonly tested for inflammation. This is also known as a biomarker because it tells doctors if one or more body tissues are healthy or not. Simply put, you can test your CRP levels to find out if there is an elevated level of inflammation in your body.

You might be happy to find out that the CRP test is inexpensive and it can tell a great deal about your general health, particularly your cardiovascular system. Keep reading to find out more about this substance and what to do if you have high CRP levels.

What Is C-Reactive Protein?

C-reactive protein is an enzyme produced by your liver as a result of detecting inflammation in your body. This substance might be in high quantities for women who take birth control pills as well. Acute inflammation is usually good and doesn't harm your health.

However, chronic inflammation can raise the levels of CRP and cause life-threatening health issues such as diabetes, auto-immune diseases, etc. High CRP is also associated with cardiovascular diseases such as coronary artery disease, atherosclerosis, and more.

What Are the Normal Levels of CRP?

Knowing the normal levels of CRP helps you interpret the results on your own. If you have high CRP levels, you are more likely to develop cardiovascular diseases or other life-threatening problems. Here are some details:

• Anything lower than 1mg/L of blood is associated with an insignificant risk of developing health problems
• Anything between 1mg/L and 3mg/L is associated with a moderate risk of cardiovascular disease
• Having CRP levels higher than 3mg/L is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular problems

Ordering a CRP test is easy and, in most cases, you get the results back in just a few business days. You can compare your results against these reference values or ask your primary healthcare provider to help you.

If your results are within the normal range, you don't have much to worry about. However, if your CRP levels are higher, your doctor might ask for more tests. This means that there is inflammation in your body and its cause needs to be detected.

Keep in mind that high-intensity physical exercise might increase the inflammation level in your body, so you could stop working out a few days before taking this test to get more accurate CRP results.

What Do High CRP Results mean?

As mentioned earlier, CRP levels higher than 2-3 mg/L are usually associated with an increased risk of developing cardiovascular diseases. This means that your heart, veins, and arteries can be affected. Atherosclerosis, as well as heart attacks, coronary artery disease, and stroke, are just a few complications usually associated with high CRP levels.

On top of that, recent studies show a link between abnormal CRP results and type 2 diabetes. This life-threatening disease refers to the inability of your body to process the sugar in your blood. This is caused by chronic inflammation, an unhealthy lifestyle, and other factors.

High CRP levels have been associated with type 2 diabetes in African Americans, but not limited to this group of people. C-reactive protein is also consistently high in people who struggle with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Very high CRP levels of 10 mg/L are usually associated with other types of diseases such as autoimmune arthritis and irritable bowel syndrome. The higher your CRP results, the more inflammation is in the body.

Other diseases associated with very high CRP levels are tuberculosis, bone infections, pneumonia, and even cancer.

In short, having high CRP levels is a sign that there is inflammation in your body and you need to do something about it. The good news is that a CRP test is inexpensive and it tells you if you need to do more health investigations or not.

How to Lower Your High CRP Levels

If you discover that your CRP levels are abnormally high, you can do something to lower them overall. For example, doctors might recommend doing at least 30 minutes of physical exercise every day to improve your overall health.

At the same time, the Mediterranean diet has been shown to decrease CRP levels in people of all ages. It consists of a diet based on vegetables, legumes, seeds, and nuts. A staple in the Mediterranean diet is extra virgin olive oil which is highly recommended for heart health.

Another important thing you can do to lower your CRP levels is to quit smoking. This bad habit is associated with a plethora of health conditions and life-threatening diseases such as lung and mouth cancer, diabetes, and others.

Excessive drinking can also have a negative effect on your cardiovascular system. Alcohol puts a lot of stress on your body, particularly the liver. This might trigger an increased release of CRP as a result of higher levels of inflammation in the body.

Reducing alcohol consumption or quitting it altogether for a few months might significantly decrease your CRP levels.

How to Test Your CRP Levels?

The test is done using a single blood sample drawn from your arm. Based on the results, doctors might order additional tests such as an EKG, stress test, and CT scans of your coronary artery. This could be the case especially if you have very high CRP levels.

Remember that the CRP test shows that there is inflammation in your body. However, it doesn't necessarily tell you where it is occurring. You might need additional tests to find out if your heart is affected, your coronary artery, your bones, or other tissues and organs in your system.

Order Your Test Today!

One of the greatest advantages of direct-to-consumer labs is that blood tests are increasingly inexpensive. The CRP blood test is also cheap and it allows you to find out a great deal about your health with little to no effort.

Order your CRP test from DiscountedLabs.com today and you will get the results back in just a few business days!