Patient's Perspective Paper: An Update

[Scotty]

Our paper entitled 'The Diagnosis and Treatment of Hypothyroidism: A Patient's Perspective' has been reviewed and updated, and the new version is now available via the TUK website. Here is the link:

thyroiduk.org/tuk/thyroid_a...

[Anthea55]

Many thanks for this paper. The previous version was very informative and has been posted on here several times - also on Facebook I think.

Are there any major revisions to look out for? or shall I gently plough through it?

Well done. It should be required reading for all medical students.

[Scotty in reply to Anthea55]

There are no major changes to the information we presented in the first version. We have just moved some of the sections around to eliminate unnecessary repetition and made some wording changes to improve the way it reads. There are also one or two additional references. Otherwise, it is the same paper as before.

[shaws Administrator]

Thanks for posting and it is updated 2017. I think it should be sent to every Endocrinologist/doctor.

It should be circulated to all Endocrinologists/doctors

This is an excerpt I liked and if GP or Endo is being difficult, give them a copy of the whole document. We might not be popular but if they aren't doing their work effectively, i.e. ensuring clinical symptoms are diminishing till patient is well they need to read it.

I haven't read it all yet but found the part that states 'The All Important Question is how to reliably diagnose a patient as either hypo, euthyroid, or hyperthyroid. etc etc.excellent.

[mourneadventurer]

Thank you Scotty,

I enjoyed reading this as far as it has gone.

I also would've like to have seen the impact of T3 within the cell. A diagram of what it actually does! Cardiac tissue can only utilise T3.

Regards

Mourneadventurer

[Scotty in reply to mourneadventurer]

Okay, we'll give that some thought.

[Shibby]

This bit I have pondered over a while "Unfortunately the ranges for FT4 (and also FT3) are not well standardised among different test machine manufacturers, generally validated, or based on large databases of healthy adults with no thyroid pathology".

Good to see I'm not the only one thinking about it. If TSH ranges can be off for so many people, wonder how much the FT4/FT3 ranges can be off also?

[Scotty in reply to Shibby]

There were two path labs in Nottingham that blood samples could be sent to and we noticed that they had different reference ranges from each other! Must be the same elsewhere. That's why just quoting the results is not enough, you need to always quote the reference range as well.

[Littlewebby]

Hi can't access the paper - states a 404 server error. Please can you check the link & advise. Many thanks

[helvella Administrator Thyroid UK in reply to Littlewebby]

LouiseRoberts RedApple

[RedApple Administrator in reply to Littlewebby]

Try this thyroiduk.org/tuk/thyroid_a...

[Littlewebby in reply to RedApple]

Fantastic - thank you!!