children's TSH

[bd79og]

My 9 year old son has been "off colour" for months and we recently had a lot of blood tests for him. The TSH was 2.93 (.35 - 5.5) which was described as normal, I think it is rather high, it was not a fasting test. His ferratin was low despite several months of multivitamins and B12 and he has been prescribed iron, his B12 was 600 ish (I've been supplementing). The rest I can't remember but will try and get a print out from the GP later this week. We are awaiting the results for the gluten antibodies test. I was diagnosed with hypo last week (TSH 9.55) my TSH was very similar to my sons back in March again on a non fasting test and he has very similar symptoms to me. I've been given levo (which I've just started and seem at the moment to be feeling worse). Is he rather young to be having hypo problems? My GP is blaming some of it on my age and menopause.

[jimh111]

An average TSH for his age is 2.3 ( ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl... ) so nothing is abnormal. Also bear in mind that being male he is ten times less likely to get autoimmune primary hypothyroidism than you, plus he is very young. How does he feel about it? If he's not worried I'd wouldn't be too concerned. He may be feeling a bit low because you are not well, boys tend not to express these things.

Jim.

[bd79og in reply to jimh111]

thanks, it is nice to know it is unlikely to be the same as me as I certainly don't want my children to get this!

[acc1]

Bear in mind that iron is needed for conversion of T4 to T3, so if his ferritin is very low then perhaps that could lead to a slightly higher TSH due to poor conversion?

Low ferritin, even without anaemia, has quite an overlap in symptoms with hypothyroidism. I'd be tempted to see how the iron supplementation goes, possibly repeat thyroid function tests if he still has symptoms when his ferritin is more normal. As jimh111 says, he's not far off normal for his age.