This poll is ONLY for those born in the UK AND ... - Thyroid UK
This poll is ONLY for those born in the UK AND WITH Autoimmune Thyroid Disease (including Graves).
Inspired by Helvella’s post (here healthunlocked.com/thyroidu... ) about month of birth being significant for Autoimmune Thyroid disease diagnosis in Denmark, I've set up a poll for our forum.
The forum poll feature is ridiculously limited, so I've had to tailor it somewhat!
So, just select from the month of birth options that is most applicable for you, and also confirm that you were born in the UK.
NB this poll is ONLY applicable to those with a confirmed diagnosis of Autoimmune Thyroid Disease (i.e Hashimotos and/or Graves) and born in the UK.
Also, this is really just for fun. As well as the severe limitations of the poll feature here, results are necessarily skewed because of the skewed membership of a support forum.
So nothing can seriously be construed from the results of this poll 
Thanks for explaining, I did wonder about this. :0)
Interesting
Yes
I can't read the results which one is the most please
Hover your mouse over the titles.
July/August is biggest at the moment, with 50 votes.
September/October is currently lowest with 35 votes.
January/February & July and August seem to be currently leading, although I can't see the full results on my iPad.
How many people have had it triggered by breast implants or some other foreign body?
Over here in Finland I know quite many celebrities who have had certain type of breast implants and fallen ill since. Not necessarily thyroid issues but general malaise like CFS/ME and fully recovered after removing the implants.
I have now received this poll five times today. Can you please stop sending it?
BillieSt, there is a glitch in the system that triggered multiple emails. It's not something I did deliberately 
You make it sound as if:
a) We are deciding to send it to you multiple times;
b) We are in control of your settings;
c) There are no technical issues which could cause multiple sends.
To answer in turn:
a) The emails are sent automatically and we have absolutely no control over them;
b) You can choose which email alerts you receive;
c) Technical issues need to be raised with HU as admins and members can do nothing about them.
I wonder how many also have vitiligo?
That's interesting because I have what I've always thought of as vitiligo in the inside of my right forearm, sort of from my wrist to just below my elbow. It's only there and isn't very obvious.
My sister and my mother, both born in January, have this auto immune condition.
Why is it only for people born in the U.K.?
To narrow down the correlation, other variables have to be omitted, e.g. environmental factors - weather, climate, seasons; cultural factors - diet, etc. For instance, someone who was born and grew up in South Africa would be born during the "opposite" season albeit they were born in the same month as someone born/brought up in the UK. They would also probably have eaten a superior diet and have had exposure to more sunlight.
Kakie Afshan64
The paper which prompted this poll was based on Denmark. The idea was to see if the same applied to the UK. If we include people born in other countries it means we find out nothing about those born in the UK because the data is mixed up.
As this is Thyroid UK, it does seems sensible to focus on the UK. Can't help thinking it would have been very odd if we did a poll based on, say, the USA, Greece, France or any other country.
January
Are you factoring in how many people are born in those months anyway? Hypothetically, if 50% of people in the UK were born in Jul/Aug and 50% of patients were born in Jul/Aug, then there would be no actual correlation unless there was a significant trend in other months - which, so far, is not obvious.
My first A U condition was Vitiligo at age six.
Next Alopecia at eighteen, and Hashimotos at the same time, although not actually diagnosed until after the birth of my fist child when I was twenty four.
I am seventy five now.
I was born in April. So not part of the cohort illustrated by these findings.
It looks as though August has the most people affected. Guess this must be because of all the pre-Christmas parties. Still think mine was caused by an excess of antibiotics.
Wow
Its a pity this voting is just a poll and instead to stop the manufactured levothyroxine and to put us all back on the natural product once more.
There are lots of people who do NOT do well on desiccated thyroid. Including some of the stalwart members who put in so much effort answering questions here.
In my view, starting from a viewpoint of wanting "natural" rather than "synthetic" could very well lead people down a long and very rocky road high that ultimately does them a disservice.
You also dismiss all those who, for numerous reasons (e.g. religious beliefs, allergy or intolerance of porcine or bovine products), cannot or will not use desiccated thyroid.
I agree Helvella, my American friend did so badly on desiccated thyroid she has ended up on levothyroxine and is doing very well on that so one size definitely does not fit all as they say.
Just diagonised a few months ago
The responses so far seem so close as to not really signify anything but I guess this could change over time (August).
Perhaps using Survey Monkey it would be possible to capture more data such as gender, place of birth (to compare say Yorkshire to Devon. But the NHS has all of this data and should be releasing it so that data analysts can do some heavy crunching. Co-morbidities e.g. diabetes I or II; PCOS, etc
This very simplistic poll was done in response to a specific post about a new paper. It was never expected nor intended to be any proper research.
Yes - there are several survey techniques. To prepare a decent survey requires a lot of thought and effort.
The NHS seemed quite keen to release some of the data to Google...
It was not intended as a criticism, you simply haven opened the possibilities which so few others seem to want to grasp, that is a v good thing. As for Google/NHS, the same thing happened when Google wanted to scan every book in existence - thereby abusing every author's copyright. That doesn't mean to say that people had an evil intent with what they did - more cock-up than conspiracy. Govt has since introduced a framework for ethics on data to provide guidance gov.uk/government/publicati... The sad thing for many doctors is that they leave university/med school and don't stay curious or plugged in to research, especially GPs who have even less time to specialise. More data but more simply expressed and to the point - and faster!
Well Thyroid UK did a pretty significant survey not that long ago:
Im afraid i cant see relevance of this as it wont matter what month of the year you are born. Automimmune disorders are genetic and run in families.
Please read my comment at the top of this thread, then you may understand what prompted this lighthearted poll
Perhaps you'd like to point that out to the authors of the paper which may be found here:
healthunlocked.com/thyroidu...
Marianne Thvilum,
Corresponding author
E-mail address: m_thvilum@yahoo.dk
Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Odense University Hospital, Denmark
Mind, I find it very difficult to disagree with an observation. Easy to disagree with an argument but unless you are pointing out an error in their technique or analysis, how do you tell them that what they reported seeing, they didn't actually see?
I dont see the poll showing anything relevant. I do think that although there is a genetic component, epigenetics play a part... so genes can be turned on and off. Often epigenetics may be linked to nutritional deficiencies triggering a reaction, and weaknesses showing/not showing because of nutritional factors etc. NB speaking as someone who hasnt yet found the answer to something my father and I suffered from... but am still looking!
I currently take 200 mg of levothyroxine, but suffer terrible pins and needles and internal body itching, comes on around midnight each night and it gets so bad you feel like amputating your feet and hands, neck and back of head, because scratching the top of your skin, doesn't do anything to help ease it, its hard to explain but it feels like millions of biting red ants in your bones, biting away at you, I have visited a professor and he thought it might be non hodgkin's but that was ruled out, he said he has a number of patients with the same ailments, but they thinks its a neuro problem and it could be part of the thyroid issues, does anybody else suffer side effects from the thyroid tablets.
Have you thought of dropping your dosage slightly?
i was on 250mg but gp dropped it to 200mg i wonder if it could be stress
Sounds more like Hives, my wife suffered with those same symptoms for 5 years, used to scratch til she bled, then one day is just went away. She was prescribed anti hystemines.
I have paid these online consultants and sent them pictures when it flares up, and they said there is no rash and the skin doesnt have hives,which i thought at first it could be, but im wondering if i am allergic to the hormone in the thyroid tablet. I am on antihystermines, and have tried many different types, but still to no avail or getting rid of the issue.
Can't see anything as I am on an iPad. Born in December so what's the verdict?
and the rest
hyper thyroid in early teens after glandular fever and then hypo mid 20's and long list of auto immune since chemo late 20's
August ftw 😀
