Lots going on..uncertainty for me..(if that's a word even).
I ve been hypothyroid since I was 41...Im 57 now..
So just post menopause in the last 3 years as well...All this stuff can cause joint aches and pains..pretty sure.
On a whim I asked Doctor to check me for autoimmune suff, not even sure why now...brain fog, different aches...When I first went into menopause, my body had my med(synthroid) making me over medicated...meanwhile my T4..T3 were getting wiggy..telling my body to produce more hormone (like a paradox)...New town/new docs..they just kept watch, kept changing level of meds...time goes on..i wake up deaf in one ear..it came and went...I figure body is trying to tell me something...So diff professionals, but never and endocrinologist yet...A rhumetologist very quickly diagnosed me with mild lupus...with just ANA 1:320 homogenous and finely speckled...and moderate elevated crp 7..was 11 with ear thing...Im still wondering if it is lupus...nothing else came back positive...Can you can have elevated ANA with hypothyroid stuff.?.Plus they seem to ignore that at Docs.. The big thing for lupus is stress/hormones/and 5% hereditary stuff...I have RA in my family, but tested negative for that...but Stress yup, hormone things yup...I have no fever, but I have night sweats..(menopause stuff)..it all crosses over..could be menopause, thyroid, lupus??? Im taking my synthroid, and Im trying to go as low dose I can on lupus meds Plaquenil...I dislike medication, and turned down steroids... "
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yes instead of writing it all again, I cut and pasted from another page where I was asking same question. Thanks for taking off things... My last TSH test was 2.54, and yes I don't live in the UK anymore...I reside in Canada...but my parents were British and the rest of the clan are in the UK. My thyroid has been bouncing around, and when they tweek the meds, it doesn't stay in a good range for long...
Hi and welcome. We have quite a few members from other lands so you are not alone. I'm afraid I don't know much about lupus and the ANA test but I know lupus and thyroid disease do occur together. I have a friend with both. When the lupus is controlled the thyroid is also controlled. When the lupus gets bad so does the thyroid. That may just be her though.
Thanks Carolyn...yes the autoimmune stuff can come in clusters apparently...seems the rhumey diagnosed me too easy though on just 2 tests ANA and crp...He wanted me on plaquenil, and steroids right away, pretty aggressive approach to later turn around and say I have mild lupus. Im wondering if its just my thyroid acting up because of menopause, and wondering if a naughty thyroid (hypo) can give you high ANA readings too...That rhumey has a big ego, and very hard to get to see any Docs over here now. I don't have a regular gp, she went back to south Africa (but the other docs try to cover her patients). Someone pulled strings for me to see this rhumetologist...the others are all booked up for long time.
Can you post your lab ref ranges for your TSH and crp? Impossible to evaluate otherwise. Not that I'll be able to help with this. I can only tell you that hypothyroid px do sometimes experience deafness, tinnitus and ear pain.
I don't think Louise was calling you an outsider. "Wiggy" and "Synthroid" outed you though
My thyroid test was 2.54 last time they checked and my CRP was 7...Wiggy a word I made up...yes synthroid is what they use here..i guess levothyroxine? I take 0.112mg daily
Hi, without leaving this site, joint Lupus UK also who will be helpful with your results, some of my results look like this, I do have Systemic Lupus, but also four other things, the speckled results indicated mixed connective tissues disease. If you end up with severe chronic fatigue beyond your thryoid problems, if you have a good rheumatologist they may consider Plaquenil for you, which takes weeks to work but is good on fatigue. However I have opted for LDN.
ps just re read your post and seen you are already on LUPUS uk (sorry) x
Lupus is an unstable condition which you can't ignore - you need it managed. It is also very common to develop other autoimmune diseases alongside it. For instance, extremely common to have Hughes Syndrome, Sjogrens and Thyroid problems as a trio of disease and in some cases with the addition of Systemic Lupus. It is all sign of an overactive immune system which needs to be calmed down!
Hi DG. I can't offer definitive information, but after many years of undiagnosed hypothyroidism and auto immune thyroid disease can recall my producing a positive ANA titre. I can't remember the details though as it was quite a few years ago. I seem to have recovered from whatever the cause was.
My GP in her usual bureaucratic manner insisted that it didn't amount to a dignosis of lupus, that that requires several other confirming factors to be present at the same time. She as a result left me and my pretty obvous auto immune symptoms untreated.
She over many years and despite obvious and clearly identified hypothyroid symptoms in a very similar manner emphatically denied that I had thyroid disease (went for the usual mutterings about depression, and the associasted insistence that my 'normal' results from the stock blood tests eliminated any possibility of hypothyroidism) - so my going down a few years later with hypothyroid related health issues, being found to have an enormously enlarged thyroid, having a thyroidectomy for thyoid cancer (the pathology report listed cellular changes consistent with advanced auto immune disease) and my relative recovery (with the help of T3 - but only after a after a long road to get it optimised) didn't do much for her credibility.
This sort of bureaucratic/anti-holistic thinking that ignores inconvenient symptoms seems nevertheless to be the conservative/mainstream view.
It seems pretty clear that in practice that i'd gone down a fairly typical road - the usual sequence of chronic stress, various triggers and genetic tendencies leading to gut troubles and endocrine imbalances/metabolic problems, to auto immune disturbances, to thyroid disease and to problems in converting and using what thyroid hormone I was producing.
My auto immune issues seem to have been just one facet/symptom of what for many here is a fairly typical complex of medical issues. Metabolic disease/syndrome if you like.
Recovery seems (through proper thyroid replacement, dietary and lifestyle changes, supplementation, steps to reduce a tendency to produce chronically high levels of cortisol/stress hormone etc) as above to have been possible. I seem to be OK now apart from stuff like residual food sensitivities and some loss in stamina. No sign of any lupus for example.
It's on the diet/lifestyle side in retrospect been a fairly typical route - eliminate wheat/flour, gluten, milk, sugar/simple carbohydrates, and processed foods; reduce carbs, exercise, meditation/mindfulness work and so on.
I guess the picture I'm trying to paint is that despite medicine often labelling and treating lupus as a distinct disease that there may be quite a long gestation period during which we develop and display all sorts of auto immune issues - as a part of the sort of descent into metabolic illness described above. That the conventional diagnosis of lupus becomes possible only very late on in the game - and is likely more of the usual medical plucking of a single set of symptoms out of a much broader syndrome and labelling it as a disease (business opportunity) to be handled by their particular discipline.
Professor Yehuda Schoenfeld (a highly credible doctor from an Israeli hospital and autoimmunology research centre) seems to have been a leader in recognising this sort of approach is not in the patient's interest - that while the differing forms of auto immune disease manifest differently, that they have common underlying causes.
The recent emergence of the field of autoimmunology seems to be the result of a push in more progressive sections of medicine to recognise that immune disease may be one aspect of a more complex medcial scenario, and to pull the treatment of the multiple forms of auto immune disease together under a single discipline.
There are quite few presentations by him (and others) up on YouTube, here's two to get started:
I guess what I'm suggesting is that depending on specifics (hard to tell from this distance) that it's not impossible that your scenario (and your positive ANA titre) could be somewhat similar to my experience. That there may be scope for considerable improvement (in what may be a linked set of symptoms) by similar holistic means to those that helped me…
I have Hashimoto's and also have positive ANA which I've had for a number of years. The doctor hasn't referred me as yet to a Rheumatologist and I've no idea what it means. I would love to know if you find out any more information. I have continued ill-health due to M.E with loss of stamina and energy being the two main symptoms which I can't push through otherwise other symptoms appear. Good luck in your search for answers.
Thanks Karen....my energy got really bad too, but can be lupus...can be hypothyroidism too..even post menopause. I notice male Doctors don't even ask about menopause..or post menopause..
I've been to see my doctor today and got absolutely nowhere. I have the 'ME' label and so there's nothing they can do. Oh and because I haven't worked for a long time what do I expect with my energy?! Have I tried graded exercise, she asks?!!!! Before Christmas I was asked by the same doctor if I had hot flushes yet and I was probably feeling ill because the nights were getting darker! I despair.
If you see this...do you remember what your ANA reading was, and the pattern? I wonder what it looks like with a thyroid prob??? My thyroid behaves like hashi's, but no one ever called it that...One newbie kind of gp said, I had it too long to be hashi's....Thing is after 16 years my thyroid almost didn't need meds at one point, and that same Doc said maybe your cured..lol
She soon remembered id been this way for ages...Now I don't even have a regular gp (we are running out of them in BC/Canada)
My ANA results have been different over the years, ranging from 1:80 (normal) to 1:1280 with everything inbetween. I seem to recall the pattern was speckled. I saw a Gastro Enterologist in 2010 who said that my ANA was nothing to do with Lupus but because I had thyroid problems. If you have antibodies to your thyroid gland then you have Hashimoto's. Hope this helps. It is hard to find things out as no-one seems to be able to tell us anything these days - I've just been passed from pillar to post.
I found an old test on paper they did for ANA another time, because I have disc probs DDD (from dance aerobics I over did.) My back would go out easy...They thought RA so asked my gp to test...my ANA was 1:160 and speckled and he said nothing in 2008...so jump ahead to 2013, and it was 1:320 fine speckle and homogenous, and this Doc was all over it...I read things that say yes can be thyroid and positive ANA, and had professors at universitys studying thyroid things say no...So confusing...They only ever have done the TSH test..occasionally t4 t3....That professor guy said ignore the T4 test as im on medication, its for people not on medication (I take levo/synthroid)...So confusing and symptoms cross over...Doctors, especially specialists can be hard to discuss with, "huge egos"...
I read if you have positive ANA and over 1:80, they might just ignore it, if you have no other symptoms...(it can be normal)..the higher it goes, the more likely you have autoimmune stuff...Then the patterns point to things...Speckled suppose to point to lupus and connective tissue disease...But then I read speckled can be a normal ok pattern...
The ANA was my only positive test...and the CRP inflammation thing...everything else negative. My thyroid is like a yo yo...
Yes, it is very confusing and I don't know if even doctors and other medics understand it and, of course, they rarely talk to each other so don't always join the dots. I think (and lots of people agree, apart from docs and GMC) that T4 is better test than TSH as you can see if you have enough thyroxine and are at the higher end of the T4 range which is where you should be in order to feel better. T3 should also be checked and just doing the TSH test is lazy although okay according to the GMC. My TSH is negligible which doctors don't like but my T4 is within range and I've definitely felt better when it's like that.
It is hard to find and see someone who you can have faith in that they know what they're doing so I do sympathise. If I were you I'd push for a T4 and T3 test and ask for the printout of the results.
I did, and published it here...ladies thought it looked good...My t4 is getting close to out of range 18.4...my t3 is fairly normal , and my TSH is low like 0.16 because im slightly over medicated right now...Im afraid to let them touch my meds, because the slightest tweak, and my thyroid will bounce quite quickly to the slow side...That professor gp said ignore the t4 reading, its for people not on t4....(Im on levo-synthroid 112mg)...one a day.
I wonder if I really have lupus, and if its just some odd thyroid stuff, and along with post menopause ups and downs...The men gp don't even ask about menopause...BUT hormone times of life are when stuff happens, like lupus etc...Hormones, stress, and maybe 5% hereditary factor are the recipie ....
Not sure wish there weren't. There are more tests ... just waiting for them sucks . Sorry. I was told my thyroid stopped working, so take it out already. It hasn't worked right forever. And it hurts so bad. Now ANA thing. I can't sleep. My daughter has hypothyroidism and rheumatoid arthritis. Now my son showing symptoms. I was pregnant with him when I had Graves, diagnosed months after his birth. Good luck. My doctor is trying. Just need pain gone and all the other stuff, can't see anymore,too blurry. Good luck
Just want to add..Ive been a health nut all my life..into organic, workout everyday..im not a vegetarian, but don't eat the red meat much, mostly fish and chicken..I did go thru buckets of stress around my thyroid first acting up in my 40's....This time where they factor in lupus and my thyroid also acting up....My Mom was dying and I her only caregiver, I was a single parent, and menopause kicked in too, at 52 and a half...it was a wild year, and that's just some of it...so I do have the ingredients for lupus there, stress,hormones etc...But if its just thyroid stuff and that ANA test can be high for that, doctors should not give out the pills for things so easy! My rhumetologist is not easy to talk with...Gp seem vague on issues..
Hi, I have had thyroid problems off an on for 15 years that I know of, hyperthyroidism first then hypothyroidism...back and forth with high stress periods. Pregnancy,injuries, depression,etc. On process of more thyroid tests, and just got told about ANA TEST. No Rheumatoid arthritis, but was 160 while on high doses of diclofenac(anti-inflammatory) as well as aspirin for chest pain. And 800 mg of ibuprofen. My throat neck have severe bouts of pain, hoarse voice, trouble breathing...etc All of this was found by my Dr. treating for pain management from accident.
He said my thyroid stopped working, need more tests, then after a chest pain attack and hospital . He sent me for blood work. ANA issue. If I get any answers for you, I will tell you, I shouldn't feel this front neck pain with the other pain meds I am on, nor should my ANA be so high with meds I am on . I am scared. As so know you must be. Next month I shall ask my Dr. your ?. Good luck .
a friend thinks i have hashimotos, but says only naturopath will test for that...still the ANA is an interesting thing to see if it holds weight for thyroid issues...
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Just needing a moan. Had an awful month. Ended up twice in hospital after a heart attack and had to have an angioplasty and a stent put in. 
Complete thyroidectomy & meds
I'm giving up!
