Breathlessness and Depression

[anniec11]

I read some post on here regarding 'unexplained' breathlessness. I too have constant breathlessness, which is becoming extremely debilitating. I have been on Levothyroxine for some 35 years and take 150mcg daily. Strangely, I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism only after I suffered a kind of breakdown and severe depression. I was put on antidepressents and am still on tghem. The dicovery of hypothyroidism was coincidental at this time. I have often thought that my severe depression was actually caused by the undiscovered Hypothyroidism itself? The breathlessness, constant tiredness and air hunger has really only become a big issue for the last couple of years. Until now, I have acctually put that down to spinal surgery 3 years ago, which was not a success, but am not at all sure now. Needless to say the medical profession are not in the slightest bit helpful, the best I have been offered following an Xray and spirometry tests (normal) is physiotherapy, teaching me to breathe correctly! Obviously my GP is not interested in T4 or T3. There have been several links to blood test establishments via post on here, but I am wondering if there are some that can be recommended? And which type I might be best to go for? Any views and advice would be hugely appreciated.

[hunny59]

Hi anniec11 and welcome to the forum. There will be others along shortly who I'm sure will provide valuable information but firstly do you have any results of recent blood tests giving the results of TSH/T3/T4 (together with the ranges for those tests)? Some of your symptoms sound as though they may overlap with B12 deficiency which a lot of us hypos have as well.

Blue Horizon is a reliable company which is used by many of us on here and they do a variety of thyroid related blood tests. The thyroid +10 will check TSH/T3/T4 and also your folate, ferritin and B12 and can be done using finger prick collection.

Any results can be posted on here and the folks who are more knowledgeable than myself can give you advice.

[Clutter]

Anniec11,

Blu Horizon and Genova are highly regarded on the forum thyroiduk.org.uk/tuk/testin... Blue Horizon Thyroid Plus 3 checks TSH, FT4 and FT3. Plus 6 includes thyroid peroxidase and thyroglobulin antibodies. Plus 11 is the most comprehensive home test and adds ferritin, vitamin D, B12 and folate.

I had breathlessness on Levothyroxine and spirometry showed good lung function. Adding T3 to Levothyroxine calmed a number of adverse effects Levothyroxine only caused me.

[shaws Administrator]

It's bad enough that you were misdiagnlosed initially. Your nervous breakdown etc could have been due to being hypo, i.e. in that your brain wasn't getting sufficient T3 (I am not medically qualified). Psychiatrists can prescribe T3 for depressed patients.

We remain undiagnosed due to the medical profession being unaware nowadays of clinical symptoms. Before the blood tests and levothyroxine were introduced we were diagnosed and given NDT. If we improved we had hypo. If our TSH doesn't reach 10 in the UK, we will remain undiagnosed and very ill. Some doctors will prescribe if TSH is in the upper part of the range, i.e. approx 5.

Your breathlessness is most probably due to being underdosed and the doctor who provides the information would never prescribe levothyroxine, only NDT or T3 for thyroid resistant patients.

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