Positive anti-bodies

[catalonia]

Hi all,

Does anyone know, if your anti-bodies start to increase again (after steroids and chemo drugs) will the TED get worse? should the doctors be doing anything about it.

Mine were 33.5 (00.00 - 34.0) in October, doctor said the usual "that's fine" because its in the scale, fact that its only .5 off the upper limit appeared irrelevant

[marram]

Hi catalonia, so sorry that you have not received a reply to your question. Yes is the short answer. If your Graves antibodies go up, there is a strong possibility that your eyes could get bad. This is much more likely if you smoke, and will also be much worse if you smoke.

It is a good idea to have regular eye checks and tell them that you have antibodies so that if your eyes change suddenly they can refer you quickly to an eye specialist. An endocrinologist is not the best person to sort out TED.

I have a good optician and she noticed that the vision my right eye had suddenly changed much more than my left and referred me within two weeks to an eye specialist who checked my antibody level, did lots of very detailed measurements and said that I had active TED. He started me on Selenium to reduce the antibodies and eye drops to relieve the pain and soreness, and my eyes have been stable now for six months, I am due to go back in June 2015 for a follow-up.

Marie xx