Hi I have just managed to get my gp to give me my blood test results after yesterday him telling me I'm in normal range

[Vivsavage]

Results in September was tsh 10.15

T4 12.4

My results 3 weeks ago

Tsh 5.90

T4 15.7

I'm confused as he said I'm in normal range and no need to adjust dose x

[PinkNinja]

What medication are you taking and how much?

If you are taking any thyroid hormones your TSH needs to be below 1 in most cases. Just getting your TSH back within range is pointless as your "normal" is likely very different from the top of the range. Anyway, TSH is pretty useless for working out what whether you are on the correct dose. It has been shown in a study earlier this year that TSH doesn't relate to T4 and T3 levels in the way it should in hypothyroid patients. It is fine if you have a normal thyroid or an overactive thyroid, but it doesn't correlate for hypothyroid patients.

If you can, get hold of Dr Toft's book "Understanding Thyroid Disorders". In there he clearly states that most people need a TSH below 1 (or even suppressed in some cases) in order to restore T4 and T3 levels to where the patient will feel well. Dr Toft is former chair of the British Thyroid Association (the body that is responsible for the current guidelines) and the book is published in association with the BMA so it will be difficult for your doctor to argue. It is probably just that your doctor isn't aware of this. It doesn't seem that doctors are adequately trained in thyroid disorders. After all, it only requires a little white pill to treat (yeah, right!)

Hopefully your doctor will be more helpful once you have shown him the book. He may try and point out that increasing will cause heart problems and osteoporosis, but this is a myth. That will only happen if your T3 is significantly above the range. You are more likely to suffer from heart problems and osteoporosis if you aren't getting enough thyroxine (and diabetes, and high cholesterol, and depression, and... so on).

I hope that helps. Hopefully once your TSH is below 1 you will start to feel better

Carolyn x

[Vivsavage]

Hi I'm on 125 of Levo I had my t3 checked and he said it was fine xxx

[Marz in reply to Vivsavage]

...what is fine ? Do you have the result ? - the most important one of all is T3 as it's the hormone required by every cell in your body. Do let us know what happens when you show your GP the book suggested by CarolynB......

Good Luck !........

[Vivsavage]

Will do I had a fight getting these results xxx

[helvella Administrator Thyroid UK in reply to Vivsavage]

You should not have had any problem - but all too often we do hear of people having difficulty.

Have a look here:

thyroiduk.org.uk/tuk/NHS_In...

Did you by any chance get the reference range for FT4? It is difficult to know where you are without that information.

By the way, if you click on the blue "Reply to this" under a response, then the person you are responding to gets an email so they know you have replied.

Rod

[Totoro]

You really need the laboratory reference ranges to go with these results as each lab is slightly different. Your TSH is 5.9, usually a TSH range will only go up to about 5.

I wouldn't be surprised if you would benefit from more medication. This Scottish study ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/199... showed that patients with a TSH of over 4 (which they classified as high) had a higher risk of heart and fracture problems.

[Vivsavage]

Tsh

range is (0.35 -5.5 )

And t4 range is (10.3 - 22,7) sorry I forgot to put that up x

[ianessex]

hi viv so to get this straight,,, your on 125 levo

your recent tsh is 5.9 range to 5.5

your ft4 is 15.7 range to 22

your doc says your normal and need no increase,,,,, certainly looks undertreated to me,,

[Vivsavage]

Yep you have summed it up thing what has got me he rang me Monday and said I have great news you are in normal range I picked up the print out yesterday and it clearly states I'm above range lol xxx