I TRIED TO QUOTE YOUR RESULTS BUT THE POST GOT FUCKED UP. HERE’S MY RESPONSE ON YOUR BLOODWORK
Hi hon,
okay so I’m sure you know those are incomplete tests and not quite the right ones. Here’s the breakdown of what you’ve got tested so far:
[quote]Thyroid PERO AB 27 (0-20) - Thyroid PERO AB is one of the thyroid antibodies. Positive antobody tests indicate hashimotos thyroiditis (autoimune thyroid disease). you have a slightly eleveated level of this ONE antibody. You are not too far outside the range so its not a conclusive diagnosis. you will need to be tested for the other antibody which is anti-TPO. Here is some information from the Stop The Thyroid Madness book on Hashimotos:
Did you get a diagnosis of Hashimotoâ??s Disease, or someone has just suggested you might have it?? Itâ??s a very common form of thyroid disease, and can also be called Hashiâ??s or Thyroiditis. See here for a more thorough explanation of thyroiditis.
WHAT IS HASHIMOTOS? Hashimotoâ??s Thyroiditis is an autoimmune thyroid disease in which your thyroid is being attacked by your own immune system via antibodies, attempting to destroy your gland as if itâ??s some vile enemy. It may start out silently, but the attack will eventually cause an inflammation and gradual destruction of your thyroid gland and can go on for years with miserable side effects to match. It can also cause nodules or lumps. It may be the most common thyroid disease, especially with women.
WHAT ARE SYMPTOMS OF HASHIMOTOS? For many, the symptoms are silentâ??the early stages of the autoimmune attack. But eventually, you start to notice the same symptoms of hypothyroid, including poor stamina, easy fatigue, feeling cold, gaining weight, dry hair and skin, constipation, etc. As it progresses, you may feel very hypo one day, and very hyper another, which is caused by the destruction of your thyroid.
Additionally, since the cells of your thyroid become inefficient in converting iodine into thyroid hormones, your thyroid compensates by swelling or enlarging, and you can have a feeling of tightness around your throat or a sore throat as a result.
The swelling can be called a goiter. You might also see variations in your lab workâ??high one time, low the next, high the next, etc. Symptoms are different from individual to individualâ??some can have the swelling; others may not, for example.
HOW DO I CONFIRM HASHIâ??S LABWISE? Hashiâ??s is confirmed by two antibodies labs: anti-TPO and TgAb. The first antibody, anti-TPO, attacks an enzyme normally found in your thyroid gland, called the Thyroid Peroxidase, which is important in the production of thyroid hormones. The second antibody, TgAb, attacks the key protein in the thyroid gland, the thyroglobulin, which is essential in the production of the T4 and T3 thyroid hormones.
Note: it is unfortunately common for a doctor to only do ONE test, and you need BOTH tests, since you can be normal in one and high in another! We have also noted that saliva does not always accurately detect Hashiâ??s as well as blood tests do.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO KNOW IF I HAVE HASHIâ??S?? As the attack increases, you will tend to swing between hypo and hyper, making dosing by labs, and especially the TSH, impossible. Your labs will be high one time, and low the nextâ?¦back and forth. The hyper is caused by the release of thyroid hormones into your blood due to the destruction. The hypo is caused by the lessening function of your thyroid due to the attack.
If you do have Hashiâ??s, you may have to insist to your lab-obsessed doctor to let you raise by the elimination of symptoms, not labs, due to this reality.
NOTE: when uninformed doctors fail to do the antibodies test on you, or donâ??t understand the swings of the attack, you can be wrongly diagnosed as having bi-polar, which is simply the hyper swing of the attack!! Or as on Australian gal called it, the â??Yeehaâ?? of her swing.
IS IT A GOOD IDEA JUST TO â??WATCHâ?? IT, AS MY DOCTOR WANTS TO DO? In the opinion of a large body of patients who followed this advice, â??watchingâ?? your Hashiâ??s is akin to watching a dog chew off your leg. Allowing the attack to continue on your thyroid can not only last for years, but cause all sorts of problems along the way of its destruction, including adrenal fatigue.
And once you add adrenal fatigue to the mix, youâ??ve got more problems to tackle. Instead, why not just stop the attack and all the consequences, as explained below. Makes a whole lot more sense, says a patient who suffered through what she calls the â??insane watchingâ??.
HOW DO I TREAT IT? You treat Hashiâ??s the same way you do just plan hypothyroidâ??with thyroid medications. Why? Because if raised high enough, they can stop the attack. We have seen those on thyroxine T4-only (aka Synthroid, Levoxyl, etc) have some success in stopping the attack, but patients who switched to Armour or other prescription desiccated thyroid noticed even better results, especially if they dosed by symptoms rather than labs.
Some doctors have unwisely recommended non-treatment until labwork â??stabilizesâ??, but that could take months and years, and you continue to suffer.
The attack can happen over a few weeks or extend into years. It has been stated that antibodies can be present for years even after you counter the attack with thyroid hormones like Armour. But patients on Armour have noted that antibodies greatly fall if they dose high enough.
IS THERE A CONNECTION BETWEEN PREGNANCY and HASHIâ??S? Pregnancy can be a strong precursor to developing Hashiâ??s, since the increased activity of your immune system can either worsen an autoimmune disease you already have, such as thyroiditis, or cause it to appear.
WHAT ELSE MIGHT I NEED TO AVOID WITH HASHIâ??S?? Research shows there can be a strong connection between having Hashimotoâ??s disease and gluten intolerance, or Celiac disease. Celiac disease is a digestive disorder that results in an overreaction to gluten, a protein found in most grains like wheat, rye, oats and barley, which can be found in breads, cereals, pasta and many processed foods. The overreaction, in turn, causes autoimmune damage to the intestines, which results in poor absorption of nutrients.
Gluten can also trigger the very autoimmune reactions that cause you to have Hashiâ??s. As a result, some Hashimotoâ??s patients experiment with eliminating gluten from their diets, and with good results.
BOTTOM LINE?: Patients have learned that Hashimotoâ??s is not a condition you let take its course (as some doctors will recommend), but that you treat, and with desiccated thyroid. See the Things We Have Learned page. And during that treatment, you raise according to the elimination of symptoms, not labs.
And if a doctor tells you that your Hashiâ??s is â??mildâ??, yet you have a sore throat, swollen neck, or the sensation of â??wowâ?? one time, and â??whoaâ?? another, you are much farther along in the attack than you know! Time to insist that you be put on Armour, insist to raise high enough to control the symptoms, and be your own best advocate!
***There is some evidence that taking Selenium can help reduce the TPO antibodies, but itâ??s not recommended as a â??replacementâ?? for desiccated thyroid, but as an additional help.[/quote[
BOTTOM LINE - Have your doctor run both of THESE TEST at the SAME TIME “Anti-TPO and TgAb”
Thyroglobul…57 (0-80)
Thyroglobulin…9.3 (2.0-35.0)
OKAY, these two tests confuse me. Why did your doctor run these tests? These aree tumor markers. Have you had thyroid cancer? Do you have a goiter? Is your thyroid gland swollen? Usually these tests are run on thyroid cancer survivors to test for recurrence not sure why he ran these. The good news you don’t seem to have a thyroid tumor but I wouldn’t think that you did in the first place.
T3… 125 (60-181) - this is a test of your TOTAL T3. It is pretty meaningless. You need a test of your FREET3 meaning the unbound “usable” T3 in your body. T3 is the thyroid hormone that runs your metabolism and makes you feel well. T3 is nothing to mess with and nothing you’d want to live without. GET THE FREET3 test.
FT4… 0.90 (0.89-1.76) T4 is the thyroid hormone that your body uses to MAKE T3. that is all that T4 does. Your body turns T4 into T3. You have VERY VERY LITTLE FREE (usable) T4. Ideally this lab result should be at least halfway up the lab range you’re is BAREY in range. To me this indicates a problem. Your more recent result is barely better FT4…1.00 (0.89-1.76) still BARELY in the range though slightly improved.
I’m now going to talk about your TSH results. TSH stands for Thyroid Stimulating Hormone. this is the hormone put out by your pituitary gland to tell your Thyroid to make more thyroid hormones. It is your pituitary telling your thyroid it needs to pick up the production pace.
First of all the lab range your doc and your lab are using is INCORRECT. The standard lab range was changed nationally to be .3 - 3.0 in 2003. Your doc and your lab are SEVEN YEARS behind in just test reading. My OLD GENERAL PRACTITIONER would treat ANY TSH ABOVE 2.0 as Hypothyroid. Yours is over 5.
I’m a pirate, not a doctor… but I believe you are hypothyroid. Please get the correct Hashi’s tests and also a FREET3 test. You need to know if you have autimuno hypothyroisim or not. The treatment will still be the same for each you will need hormone supplmenetation preferrably T4 AND T3 but you need those tests to confirm. And the FREET3 test will let us know how bad your “active” hormone levels are.
Welcome to the community.
that stuff NO JOKE. my family line has it, luckily so far i’m fine. but it whacks you out. hope things get cleared and you get some answers.