New Member - Wanting advice please

[dannimcc]

Hi there, this is Rosetrees (aka Carol Smith) and I'm posting for a new member, Danielle.

Danielle is blind and her screen reader can't cope with this forum, so she has asked me to post for her. Because of her disabilities Danielle can't work and she has an 18 month old daughter. She has been on thyroxine, 50mg, for 3 years and even though her TSH is 3.5 her doctor is currently refusing to raise her dose. She is being referred to an endo. I have advised her to do the Genova 24hr adrenal test as she gets a high score on the adrenal quiz.

She has asked her doctor for her test results going back to 2008.

She would like to know if anyone knows a way that she could get help with paying for the tests she is going to need.

I have told her to ask politely but firmly for T4, Free T3, vit B12, Vit D, iron, folate and ferritin tests. Any further advise for me to give her?

[Hidden]

Reverse T3 blood test too, I think if this is raised and the Free T3 is lowered this is an indication she is hypothyroid , can anyone confirm this is correct please

[Hidden]

Hi Carol

Have you ever had the Pulse Article from us that you could pass on which says that for a lot of people on treatment, they don't feel well until their TSH is at the bottom of the range and T4 towards the top?

If not, you can email me for it, but I am on holiday and not back in the office until 12th Aug.

[e-mail]

Sorry, I have no idea about help available for private tests. But I will pass on the screen reader problem to Tech - we would like to think that we would be accessible to everyone!

Louise

x

[dannimcc in reply to Hidden]

Yes, it would be good if the forum was accessible to screen readers.

[Hidden in reply to dannimcc]

I have passed on the feedback.

[shaws Administrator]

Some have recommended Dr Toft's booklet from Amazon. I haven't read it myself, but should be helpful:-

amazon.co.uk/Thyroid-Disord...

[dannimcc]

Thanks guys. I've passed your replies on to Danielle. She's going away for a few days. She is hoping that there is one doctor at her practice who might listen to her.

[shaws Administrator in reply to dannimcc]

Hi Dannimac, I have sent you a private message. If you haven't accessed it yet, you have to go to the Healthunlocked green bar and press the square box at the top right hand side, click on your name and it will show if you have a message (a red circle with a number). You then click on this and then cursor down to the link. (not quite straightforward).

[RedApple Administrator]

I have just tested the screen reading facilities on the MacBook I'm using, and it seems that the green HU toolbar at the top of every page is effectively 'blocking' access to the rest of the page content, so there's no way to read any posts at all. This is a very serious issue in my opinion. This new forum platform should have been tested for accessibility as top priority.

Somewhat ironic that this forum is hosted by Health Unlocked ... in terms of accessibility to screen readers, it is in fact Health FirmlyLocked

[helvella Administrator in reply to RedApple]

The standard Windows 7 screen narrator also struggles.

In reading the green bar, it says a few things like "HealthUnlocked" then it repeatedly says "Memory empty" (or something like that) and stops.

Tabbing takes you to a message box and it will say the poster's name <hyperlink> then stops, if you tab it goes to "Reply to this" <hyperlink>, tab again to "Recommend" <hyperlink>. If there are any tabs you have to tab from one to next and each one has <hyperlink>.

But there seems to be no way of getting it to read the TEXT in the posts. At least in Firefox 22.

If you go to messages it works somewhat better. But each user name, being a hyperlink, gets spelled out character by wearisome character.

Every sympathy with anyone needing to use Narrator and Firefox with HealthUnlocked.

Rod