I had been browsing this website for a month or so thinking that I had finally identified hypothyroidism as the cause of my many previously undiagnosed symptoms.
Having received a TSH test from my GP which returned a result of 3.5 (reference range: .5-5.0), I felt quietly confident that this was going to reveal the cause of my symptoms upon further testing.
She wouldn't grant them because she said that the levels were "healthy", a story I have read on here many times, so I decided to get private ones done yesterday, thinking I would get the answer I was looking for.
From the looks of things I think my thyroid results are just unequivocally healthy, and it is futile for me to look to pursue any thyroid related health issues further.
I have attached a copy of my results in the hope that anyone could give me the rundown on what my results may mean.
I still have RT3 results to come.
If anything my T3 looks indicative of potentially hyperthyroidism not hypothyroidism; which would clearly not be the case as my circulation and sensitivity to the cold is so bad that I develop very bad chillblains on my fingers and toes during winter.
Only thing I can think of is maybe my cells have difficulty absorbing the T3, in which case what further testing would I need to look at doing?
Thanks a lot for your time!
Written by
TimmyM
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Don't give up none of my test show anything and I have been hypo for years I use to take levo but my tests are the same on it or off it now high cortisol suggest cushings had more test it comes neg. In 2002 to 2005 I went through hell they said all my test normal I went to a homeopathic doctor he tested me for 15 days in morning and found I had pheochromocytoma a tumor on adrenal glands that produce hormones I had adrenal removed test come out normal yet they can't figure out once again what is going on I don't go by my test results cause the doctor more than one has yet to solve my problem I also have goiter over 20 nodules What's really going on .
When my tsh levels eere the same as yours I felt very unwell, if mine raise to over 2 now, after 30 years, then I still feel very unwell, tsh should be around 1 or lower, I would say your thyroid is starting to struggle.
All were pretty low, but I don't think deleteriously low.
Vit D: 48 (Range: 50-160)
Ferritin: 100 (Range: 30-500)
Vit B12: 180 (Range:130-855)
Active B12: 41 (>35)
Serum folate: 22.5 (>6.0)
I had iron, transferrin, saturation and ferritin tested twice as I had a high reading on the saturation the first time and doctor decided to go over it again.
Interestingly the iron is almost outside of the range on the high end and the ferritin is almost outside of the range on the low end despite no dietary and supplementary changes.
Also the ferritin seemed to fluctuate by what is relatively quite a bit in between what was only a couple of weeks, although maybe it just comes down to the inaccuracy of the testing methods causing inconsistencies.
I also got my homocysteine result back yesterday and it was almost 100% over the range, but I don't eat red meat and don't supplement with B12 other than a fortified almond milk that I use in the morning so it could probably be that instead of thyroid as a precipitator.
Iron is complicated and unless it's a simple case of lowish ferritin where I suggest eating liver and other iron rich foods, then I always suggest speaking to the GP.
Homeocysteine is something I don't know anything about.
Vit D: 48 (Range: 50-160)
Assuming that is nmol/L you can see it's below range. The Vit D Council recommends a level of 125nmol/L (50ng/ml) and the Vit D Society recommends a level of 100-150nmol/L (40-60ng/ml). For your current level (48nmol/L = 19.2ng/ml), the Vit D Council suggests - to reach the recommended level - supplementing with 4,900iu D3 daily (nearest is 5,000iu).
Retest after 3 months.
When you've reached the recommended level then you'll need a maintenance dose to keep it there, which may be 2000iu daily, maybe more or less, maybe less in summer than winter, it's trial and error so it's recommended to retest once or twice a year to keep within the recommended range. You can do this with a private fingerprick blood spot test with an NHS lab which offers this test to the general public:
D3 aids absorption of calcium from food and K2-MK7 directs the calcium to bones and teeth where it is needed and away from arteries and soft tissues where it can be deposited and cause problems such as hardening of the arteries, kidney stones, etc.
D3 and K2 are fat soluble so should be taken with the fattiest meal of the day, D3 four hours away from thyroid meds if taking tablets/capsules/softgels, no necessity if using an oral spray.
An oil based softgel or sublingual drops are better than tablets, eg Doctor's Best D3 Softgels, Vitabay Organic D3 liquid.
Magnesium helps D3 to work. We need Magnesium so that the body utilises D3, it's required to convert Vit D into it's active form. So it's important we ensure we take magnesium when supplementing with D3.
Magnesium comes in different forms, check to see which would suit you best and as it's calming it's best taken in the evening, four hours away from thyroid meds if taking tablets/capsules, no necessity if using topical forms of magnesium.
Also, I have read (but not researched so don't have links) that BCSH, UKNEQAS and NICE guidelines recommend:
"In the presence of discordance between test results and strong clinical features of deficiency, treatment should not be delayed to avoid neurological impairment."
And an extract from the book, "Could it be B12?" by Sally M. Pacholok:
"We believe that the 'normal' serum B12 threshold needs to be raised from 200 pg/ml to at least 450 pg/ml because deficiencies begin to appear in the cerebrospinal fluid below 550".
"For brain and nervous system health and prevention of disease in older adults, serum B12 levels should be maintained near or above 1000 pg/ml."
Active B12 is a better test than serum B12 as it measures the amount of B12 that is available to be taken up by the cells, the serum B12 test shows the total amount which doesn't show what is available to the cells.
In my opinion your Active B12 is too low to self supplement at this point. If you were a patient at St Thomas' Hospital, you would be having the test mentioned for B12 deficiency. I would be looking at the list of signs of B12 deficiency and discussing them with my GP if I had any, referring to what Viapath at St Thomas' says and asking for testing for B12 deficiency/pernicious anaemia. If you start self supplementing and you do in fact have B12 deficiency then you will screw results for the future and any possible B12 injections you may need.
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