Advice re blood results

[spragg101]

Hi all.

Just got blood results.am on 50mg of levo. They tried upping it to 75mg but i dropped it back as made me feel even worse. Still feeling awful.results are:

Tsh 2.52 ( 0.27 - 4.2)

Ft4 17.4 (12 -22)

Ft3 4.9 ( 3.1-6.8)

Im seeing endo privately in dec and hoping to come off levo and try t3 only. What are your thoughts?

All vits checked and very good

[greygoose]

You seem to be converting ok. Both your Frees are mid-range. Perhaps you have nutritional deficiencies that make it difficult for you to increase the dose. Have you had your vit D, vit B12, folate and ferritin tested?

[spragg101 in reply to greygoose]

Hi greygoose. Not sure which one is iron?

Ive got full blood count 1.35g/l- (115-160)

B12- 555 ( 197-771)

No check for folate or vit d which is what i asked for but they were good in last test

[greygoose in reply to spragg101]

It's the ferritin result that we usually look at.

When was the last test?

[spragg101 in reply to greygoose]

It was a few months ago now and i cant find it. Ive got a list of things here with no mention of ferritin which is what i asked for.

[greygoose in reply to spragg101]

Perhaps they didn't test it. You can't rely on them to test nutrients because they don't understand the importance.

[spragg101 in reply to greygoose]

Im annoyed actually because the hospital read out what would be checked and she said iron, folate and cholesterol amongst others and those 3 arent in these results at all. I wondered if drs havent printed everything for me. I will check in monday

[SlowDragon Administrator]

Some people have to increase very slowly

You can try alternate days 50/75

Or even start with 2 days at 50mcg and one day at 75mcg

Then after few weeks, increase up to alternate days

Etc

Bloods should be retested after 6-8 weeks on constant dose

For full Thyroid evaluation you need TSH, FT4, FT3 plus TPO and TG thyroid antibodies and also very important to test vitamin D, folate, ferritin and B12

All thyroid blood tests should ideally be done as early as possible in morning and fasting. Do not take Levothyroxine dose in the 24 hours prior to test, delay and take immediately after blood draw. This gives highest TSH, lowest FT4 and most consistent results. (Patient to patient tip, best not mentioned to GP or phlebotomist)

[MikeM46]

Just another thought ... has your brand of T4 changed, or , even if not, just wondering if you’re getting a bad reaction to the fillers anyway and by increasing the dose the additional amount of fillers is the culprit? Which brand is it anyway?

[MikeM46 in reply to MikeM46]

And tbh, the 25 mcg increase looks very reasonable with those results.

[spragg101 in reply to MikeM46]

Thats a good point mike. Thankyou

[SlowDragon Administrator in reply to spragg101]

Many many patients react very badly to Teva brand

Always stick to same brand of Levothyroxine once you find one that suits you