Please HELP!

[tobyjaco]

Hi. I'm new to all of this, and pretty scared. I'm 33, and the mother of 2 young boys. I have been having some recent health issues that lead to further testing, which found the following results:

T3 0.96
Free T4 0.98
TSH 0.04
Thyroid Peroxidase 172
Also, extremely low Vitamin D level

I have NO idea what these levels mean, can someone PLEASE help me understand them?! I have an appointment with an Endo in a few weeks. My symptoms have been the following:

Back/neck pain
dizzy (passed out twice in the past year)
Heat intolerance
Anxiety
Fatigue
Weight gain (16 pounds in the past 4 months)

I don't take any medications, although I was just prescribed 50,000 IU's of vitamin D, once a week, for 4 months. I will start that med this Sunday.

Any help you can give is greatly appreciated. Thank you!

[Phoenix]

Hi Tobyjaco,

Could you please post the ranges for your lab work. It will help us greatly. You don't have to repost everything, just hit the modify button on your original post, and you can add them on.

With the Peroxidase level you are showing, I would guess you have may have Hashimoto's, but, because of the low TSH, if they have not done a TSI test for Graves' disease, I would suggest they run that as well.

Did they mention doing an ultrasound and/or uptake scan? These would also be helpful.

Low vitamin D seems to be pretty common among us with thyroid issues.

I know others will be along soon to help out as well.

Welcome to the family

:hugs:

Phoenix

[Andros]

Hi. I'm new to all of this, and pretty scared. I'm 33, and the mother of 2 young boys. I have been having some recent health issues that lead to further testing, which found the following results:

T3 0.96
Free T4 0.98
TSH 0.04
Thyroid Peroxidase 172
Also, extremely low Vitamin D level

I have NO idea what these levels mean, can someone PLEASE help me understand them?! I have an appointment with an Endo in a few weeks. My symptoms have been the following:

Back/neck pain
dizzy (passed out twice in the past year)
Heat intolerance
Anxiety
Fatigue
Weight gain (16 pounds in the past 4 months)

I don't take any medications, although I was just prescribed 50,000 IU's of vitamin D, once a week, for 4 months. I will start that med this Sunday.

Any help you can give is greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Hi there and a huge welcome!!! Yes indeed, we need the ranges. Otherwise it would be a blind guess. Different labs use different ranges.

[GD Women]

Thyroid Peroxidase may also be elevated in other autoimmune conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and Sjogren's syndrome. Antithyroglobulin antibody is also used to monitor patients who have had thyroid cancer for recurrence. They are also seen in certain percent of healthy women and the incidence of these antibodies also increases with age.

However, even though your levelsare within Lab ranges, they show suspicion.
Hard to say without your Labs reference ranges.

Are you going for more test? RAIU or TR3U might be better for the way your levels relate to each other - its up to you and doc.

[tobyjaco]

Thank you for your responses. At this time, I don't know the ranges, as I do not have paper copies. I will call on Monday to get the ranges. What do RAIU and TR3U mean? I'm guessing the Endo will take care of the ultrasound and uptake scan? My general practitioner did the basic blood tests for the above posted results, as we are just in the beginning stages of trying to figure out what is going on. Thanks again for your responses.

[GD Women]

I suggest these test because your Labs do not distinguish what your levels relate.

Radioactive iodine uptake (RAIU) test measure how much tracer the thyroid gland absorbs from the blood. The test can show how much tracer is absorbed by the thyroid gland and if it is evenly spread in the gland.
RAIU helps doctor to know if the thyroid gland is working properly, find the cause of an overactive thyroid gland and plan the treatment for hyperthyroidism. As well as, distinguished early Hashi, goiter, hypothyroidism, iodine over load, subscute thyroiditis, colloid nodular goiter, Graves Disease, Painless (silent) thyroiditis and toxic nodular goiter.

The T3RU test measures the level of proteins that carry thyroid hormone in the blood. This test helps estimate the availability of thyroxin binding globulin (TBG). This is the protein that carries most of the T3 and T4 in the blood and can distinguish thyroid from Kidney failure, Overactive thyroid (hyperthyroidism), toxic nodular goiter, Nephrotic syndrome, Protein malnutrition, Acute hepatitis, Pregnanc, Underactive thyroid (hypothyroidism, primary hypothyroidism, or secondary hypothyroidism), use of estrogen, Other conditions under which the test may be performed: Chronic, thyroiditis (Hashimoto's disease), Drug-induced hypothyroidism, Graves disease, Subacute thyroiditis, Thyrotoxic periodic paralysis and Toxic nodular goiter.

These test are up to your doctor of course, as well as you. Sometimes thyroid levels and antibodies are just not enough and they can't show what the real problems are and therefore, what is really going on with us and our thyroid.

Maybe I'm wrong:confused0024: However, the Endo will do right by you, so hang in there.

[tobyjaco]

Hello. I was able to get my ranges today, so here's the info:

T3 0.96 (Range 0.7-1.7)
Free T4 0.98 (Range 0.75-1.54)
TSH 0.04 (Range 0.5-6.0)
Thyroid Peroxidase 172 (Range 0-34)
Antithyroglobulin <20 (Range 0-40)

I hope this makes it easier for you all to share your opinions of wth could be wrong with me! Thank you for your time.

[Andros]

Hello. I was able to get my ranges today, so here's the info:

T3 0.96 (Range 0.7-1.7)
Free T4 0.98 (Range 0.75-1.54)
TSH 0.04 (Range 0.5-6.0)
Thyroid Peroxidase 172 (Range 0-34)
Antithyroglobulin <20 (Range 0-40)

I hope this makes it easier for you all to share your opinions of wth could be wrong with me! Thank you for your time.

Thank you so much for doing this w/ the ranges.

Okay................you do have autoimmune disease as evidenced by the presence of the TPO (thyroid peroxidase.) And because your FT4 is in the basement and so is your TSH; I personally suspect it is thyroid disease.

You do have Antithyroglobulin even though it is below range which means to me something is afoot in that department. Antithyroglobulin is the antibody to the protein Thyroglobulin.

Complete differential diagnosis
A negative test is normal. A negative tests means no antibodies to thyroglobulin are found in blood. A positive test means antithyroglobulin antibodies are found in blood. This may be due to: [1]

Grave's disease
Hashimoto's thyroiditis
Hypothyroidism
Myxedema
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE)
Thyroid cancer
Thyrotoxicosis
Type 1 diabetes

And I am not at all surprised because I have seen your unusual labs in Graves' Disease patients (or at least hyperthyroid patients.)

You do need to get a TSI (thyroid stimulating immunoglobulin) lab test. This will rule in or rule out hyper/Graves'.

Also, I recommend an uptake scan because we need to rule in or rule out cancer as well. I really suspect that you are hyper and sometimes cancer can be the cause of hyper conditions.

Let me know what you think!

What are your clinical symptoms? Can you list them? For example............hair loss, intestinal motility problems, dry skin, sleepy, not sleepy, hyper-active, lethargic and so on?

[tobyjaco]

Wow, scary stuff. My symptoms are as follows:

Fatigue, always, regardless of how much sleep I get.

Dry skin/hair/brittle nails

Weight Gain (17 pounds since 1/1/10), not changed my diet at all, only difference was I stopped breastfeeding.

Anxiety (not always, but a little, and I'm soo NOT an anxious person)

Dizziness (not always, but enough to be annoying)

Mild depression (not too bad, but I'm a pretty positive person, and I have a really good marriage and life, so I have no reason to be depressed, but just can't shake the blah feeling!).

Chronic neck/back pain

Those are pretty much my symptoms. I also lost vision in one eye last year due to an eye stroke, but it has almost fully recovered, with only minimal white spots of blurred vision. I have fainted twice in the past year. I had a c-section with my son in 12/08, they couldn't get the needle into my spine after THIRTEEN tries, so they knocked me out. I still think some of these health issues are due to that, but of course my doctors do not. My vision loss and severe back pain (I fainted and couldn't get off the floor for an hour, after coming to because my back pain was so bad) these both happened within 3 days of each other, and it was 10 weeks after my c-section.
Hope I didn't confuse you too much with my symptoms and past health issues. Thanks for your time!

[tobyjaco]

Forgot to mention, my vitamin d level is 16. I just started (today) taking 50,000 IU's of Vitamin D once a week, for 4 months. I do not take any other medications, or supplements.

[Andros]

Wow, scary stuff. My symptoms are as follows:

Fatigue, always, regardless of how much sleep I get.

Dry skin/hair/brittle nails

Weight Gain (17 pounds since 1/1/10), not changed my diet at all, only difference was I stopped breastfeeding.

Anxiety (not always, but a little, and I'm soo NOT an anxious person)

Dizziness (not always, but enough to be annoying)

Mild depression (not too bad, but I'm a pretty positive person, and I have a really good marriage and life, so I have no reason to be depressed, but just can't shake the blah feeling!).

Chronic neck/back pain

Those are pretty much my symptoms. I also lost vision in one eye last year due to an eye stroke, but it has almost fully recovered, with only minimal white spots of blurred vision. I have fainted twice in the past year. I had a c-section with my son in 12/08, they couldn't get the needle into my spine after THIRTEEN tries, so they knocked me out. I still think some of these health issues are due to that, but of course my doctors do not. My vision loss and severe back pain (I fainted and couldn't get off the floor for an hour, after coming to because my back pain was so bad) these both happened within 3 days of each other, and it was 10 weeks after my c-section.
Hope I didn't confuse you too much with my symptoms and past health issues. Thanks for your time!

Symptoms often overlap so this becomes very confusing at best.

I know back pain; I surely do! There were times when I just plain screamed and screamed with pain and no way am I a wimp. I have a high tolerance to pain. Bleck!

Do consider taking my advice and get the TSI and an uptake scan.

[GD Women]

My opinion is still the same. Your levels do not relate to Graves' nor hyperthyroid. Your levels do show possible adrenal fatigue, other problems as allergies, hormonal imbalance, yeast, Euthyroid Sick Syndrome in which case it is eventually reversible, or subacute thyroiditis. Its really hard to tell with your type of levels. Symptoms are not too helpful for they are seen in other illness as well as TPOs and TPOs are seen in certain amount of normal thyroid women. That is why I suggest other thyroid test other than thyroid levels and antibodies.

There is also a possibility that something interfered with the Labs that gave a false readings/levels. Have you been tested a second time within 6 weeks of each other with the same levels. That would rule out false readings.

There are thyroid issues where hypo/hashi have hyper levels first and hyper/graves' have hypo levels first. But your levels do not suggest either.

I am not saying that these are your problems nor if you are or not thyroid for I am not a doctor. However I am just suggesting that these are possibilities that your levels relate to, on how they relate to each other. Your levels are in Labs but not normal.

Sometimes its not just a straight forward and simple as thyroid levels and thyroid antibody test...sometimes it take more.


Good luck and I hope you get your issues all straighten out soon.

[tobyjaco]

Thank you for your responses. Am I correct in assuming the Endo will order the TSi and Uptake scan, as well as search for the possibility of adrenal fatigue, allergies, hormonal imbalance, yeast, Euthyroid Sick Syndrome, or subacute thyroiditis? Or do I need to specifically ask for each of these to be considered?

[GD Women]

If the doctor doesn't feel the need s/he won't run test. However, I would bring it up to the Endo just as a suggestion. You don't want to appear smarter then him/her :winking0001: They seem to get insulted and then turn off. We have to play coy sometimes - you know what I mean. LOL!
Just follow through and you'll be ok. Let us know.