I was finally diagnosed as hypothyroid about 3 years ago, although I have been pretty sure there was something wrong since the late 80s - always cold, always tired and always putting on weight (I could diet strictly for 2 months and put on 3lb). Anyway, I was given a minimal dose of Thyroxine which did very little. Over the 3 years I have had to fight for more Thyroxine and am now on 100 micrograms but still cold, tired and putting on weight, although some of the other miseries have improved. I went to the GP last week and got the usual 'it's all because of your weight but you're a couch potato and you won't lose weight until you diet and exercise' routine. I fished out my phone and proved that I swim a mile or more each morning and that my diet is restricted to around 1,500 calories a day.
Given proof that I eat and exercise properly, the GP (who I have never seen before) went fishing through my notes and found I am deficient in vitamin D and that I produce thyroid antibodies.
I have no idea if is is something that should have been investigated further or referred to an endocrinologist and am wondering if anyone out there knows what the procedure should be and if the antibodies / vitamin D deficiency are related.
Thanks.
Annista
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Annista
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I take it these were TPO antibodies? If so, it means you have Hashi's. Do you know what Hashi's is? Most doctors don't, and that's why they don't mention them. The treatment for your hypo would be the same, anyway. And, best to stay away from endos because they know nothing about it, anyway.
However, your vit D should have been addressed. If you have the level, it would be a good idea to add it to your post, so that people can advise how much vit d to take.
Is there a connection? Well, Hashi's is the reason for your hypo, and hypos usually have low stomach acid, and therefore difficulty absorbing nutrients. So, yes, there is that connection. And, now, you should also get your vit B12, folate and ferritin tested, because they could be low, too.
In fact, you need a complete thyroid work up: TSH, FT4 and FT3. That way, you can find out how well you convert. It could very well be that you aren't converting the levo you're taking (T4, a storage hormone) into T3, the active hormone. It's low T3 that causes symptoms. So, you do need to know that level.
To answer the question in our thread title, many doctors attach no importance to antibodies because there is no actual treatment for them. Antibodies will gradually destroy the thyroid, so it's the resulting hypothyroidism that's treated.
However, there are things you can do to help yourself where antibodies are raised and autoimmune thyroid disease is present (patients call this Hashimoto's).
You can help reduce the antibodies by adopting a strict gluten free diet which has helped many members here. Gluten contains gliadin (a protein) which is thought to trigger autoimmune attacks so eliminating gluten can help reduce these attacks. You don't need to be gluten sensitive or have Coeliac disease for a gluten free diet to help.
Supplementing with selenium l-selenomethionine 200mcg daily can also help reduce the antibodies, as can keeping TSH suppressed.
As far as the Vit D deficiency is concerned, your doctor was negligent in not addressing this. Do you know what your Vit D level was/is? If below 30nmol/L then you should be prescribed loading doses of D3 to raise your level, then a maintenance dose should follow.
I would ask for a print out of all your results, come back and post them here and I can point you in the right direction of what you should be doing about your Vit D.
There is a connection between Hashimoto's and nutrient deficiencies. As you know our are Vit D deficient, then it's important to check other vitamins and minerals as well. Ask for B12, folate and ferritin to be tested. If ferritin comes back low then ask for a full blood count and an iron panel to see if you have iron deficiency anaemia.
Also, let's see where your thyroid levels lie. Ideally we need
TSH
FT4
FT3
We don't need antibodies because we already know they are raised so no point in retesting those. But we need to see FT3 tested at the same time as FT4. This will tell us if you are converting T4 to T3 well enough. We need a good amount of T3 because this is the active hormone which every cell in our bodies need, low T3 causes symptoms and weight loss is difficult when T3 is low.
Come back with all these test results, including reference ranges, and further comment can be made.
If your GP can't or wont do them all, we have recommended private labs that offer home fingerprick tests (or venous blood draw at extra cost) that do test bundles that cover all of them.
Welcome to our forum and I am sorry you've a problem with your thyroid gland.
Members are very helpful and will support you and we have to read, learn and ask questions, so that we can recover our health as best we can. Weight gain is the commonest quesion on the forum and the reason for unexplained weight gain is hypo (meaning low) thyroidism. The only problem we have is that doctors know none of the symptoms as the reliance is all upon the TSH alone.
It is a big learning curve for us but by asking questions we can recover our health although we will still have problems with our thyroid gland.
Blood tests have always to be at the very earliest, fasting (you can drink water) and allow a gap of 24 hours between last dose of levo and the test and take afterwards.
Also ask for B12, Vit D, iron, ferritin and folate to be tested too. Deficiencies in these can cause symptoms too.
The following may be helpful too. Doctors always seem to look for a 'way out' and blame the patient - ignore and also do not know any clinical symptoms. It is the symptoms that are supposed to be relieved through thyroid hormone replacements but that may mean T4/T3, NDT .
I have finally obtained some results (handwritten, and I'm not sure if I'm reading them right as the writing is the traditional medical scribble) from my GP, unfortunately not too up to date and not including the level of antibodies as that result has not yet been received.
So, from July 2018 I have:
Vitamin B12 265 ng/l
Folate 724 ng/l
Ferritin 92 ng/l
TSH 0.65 mll/l
FT4 19.9 plol/l
From 30 October 2017
FT3 4.3 pmol/l
Vit D 25 nm/l (I was prescribed 1600 iu of Vit D per day 4 weeks ago)
I hope that this means something to someone! I am hoping that, once the result from the antibody test I had 4 weeks ago (someone has managed to lose this) is
finally disinterred from whichever pile of paperwork it is buried in, my GP will swing into action and agree to ordering a full up to date test. If not, I'll get one done privately.
Any suggestions as to the level of Vit D I should be taking would be much appreciated as several people who know nothing more than I do have been helpfully telling me how much I should be taking and, among other things, that I need vitamin K, and should take calcium because I won't have absorbed enough while Vit D has been so low. Everyone's an expert, it seems!
Thanks for posting but you should copy and paste this new information into a new post as this one is now 22 days old and no-one else will see this new information to give you more than one comment.
When we give results, we always have to put the ranges. I see you have put some which you've been given (figures are in brackets) and this is due to labs using different ranges and it helps members to comment upon them.
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