Copper deficiency

[JRosemaryW]

Just wondered if anyone is aware of any studies linking copper deficiency with hypothyroidism as I recently read some of the symptoms are high cholesterol, premature grey hair, low body temperature and thyroid problems. Also does anyone know of an accurate way of testing for copper deficiency as from what I read if you get the balance wrong it can also cause hyperthyroidism.

[shaws Administrator]

This is a link which ight be helpful:

progressivehealth.com/thyro...

[JRosemaryW in reply to shaws]

Thank you, that's an interesting article and emphasises how important it is to get the balance right between copper and zinc.

[greygoose]

From what I've read, it would seem that hypos are more likely to have excess copper than a deficiency. And, although not many people on here have had it tested, the results I've seen would tend to support that idea.

Just being hypo will raise your 'cholesterol' reading.

[JRosemaryW in reply to greygoose]

Thank you that's interesting so it may be that hypos are more likely to have a deficiency in zinc than copper as the two seem to work together. I was diagnosed a long time ago with hypo and given a low dose of T4 which worked initially it was then increased only to 50 but then caused symptoms of hyper. I'm wondering if I have a problem converting to T3 which seems to be the case for a lot of people on here. GP's now say my readings are normal so looks like I have a bit of a battle on my hands.

[greygoose in reply to JRosemaryW]

A conversion problem would not give you hyper symptoms, quite the reverse. Because it's low T3 that causes hypo symptoms, and if you weren't converting, your T3 would be low. It's more likely that you have nutritional deficiencies. Ask your doctor to test your vit D, vit B12, folate and ferritin.

Doctors know very little about thyroid, and don't seem to understand blood test results at all. They think that anything vaguely in-range is fine. We have to educate them to the fact that it isn't fine, at all! We need the result in the right place in the range, and for TSH, that is one or under.