Hi I am new to the thyroid issues, well newly diagnosed, mine is secondary from hypopituitary along with adrenal insufficiency. I have put on 10 Kilos in the past year and have just been started on levothyroxin at 25mg. Does the thyroid medication help to re stabilise the weight gain ? I have only been on it for 3 weeks along with hydrocortisone for the adrenals
many thanks for any advise
Hassled mum
allsortswrong
When you are optimally dosed with a good level of FT3 when tested then weight loss should be possible.
25mcg is a very low starter dose, is there a particular reason you weren't started on 50mcg, 25mcg is usually for children, the elderly and those with heart problems.
It can take many months to reach your optimal dose. You should be retested 6 weeks after starting Levo, 25mcg increase, retest 6-8 weeks later, repeat testing/increasing every 6-8 weeks until your levels are where they need to be for you to feel well.
The aim of a treated hypo patient generally is for TSH to be 1 or below or wherever it needs to be for FT4 and FT3 to be in the upper part of their reference ranges, if that is where you feel well.
You probably will only have TSH or TSH + FT4 tested by the NHS, whereas it's FT3 that's the important thyroid hormone level but it's rarely tested.
Thank you for your quick reply, I am seeing the endo in nov. and will arrange private blood tests to include the FT3. I have a mitral valve prolapse with tachycardia so maybe he is being cautious, my short synacthen test was blunted so I think they are trying to get that sorted out. I will post my blood test results when i get them. Is the time of day important when having these tests done ?
When doing thyroid tests, we advise:
* Book the first appointment of the morning, or with private tests at home no later than 9am. This is because TSH is highest early morning and lowers throughout the day. If we are looking for a diagnosis of hypothyroidism, or looking for an increase in dose or to avoid a reduction then we need TSH to be as high as possible.
* Fast overnight - have your evening meal/supper as normal the night before but delay breakfast on the day of the test and drink water only until after the blood draw. Eating may lower TSH, caffeine containing drinks affect TSH.
* If taking thyroid hormone replacement, last dose of Levo should be 24 hours before blood draw, if taking NDT or T3 then last dose should be 8-12 hours before blood draw. Adjust timing the day before if necessary. This avoids measuring hormone levels at their peak after ingestion of hormone replacement. Take your thyroid meds after the blood draw. Taking your dose too close to the blood draw will give false high results, leaving any longer gap will give false low results.
* If you take Biotin or a B Complex containing Biotin (B7), leave this off for 7 days before any blood test. This is because if Biotin is used in the testing procedure it will give false results (Medichecks definitely use Biotin, they have confirmed this and the amount of time to leave the supplement off).
These are patient to patient tips which we don't discuss with doctors or phlebotomists.
I have a mitral valve prolapse with tachycardia so maybe he is being cautious
That very likely explains why you were started on 25mcg Levo.
I too have mitral valve prolapse which was discovered when trying to find the reason for my tachycardia. It's possible that my tachycardia was triggered by a change in one of my inhalers, I was changed back to my original one and it seems to have settled down.
SeasideSusie
Since allsortswrong has secondary hypothyroidism caused by hypopituitarism then the "rules" which apply to most of us for getting the "best" results from a thyroid function test don't really apply in their entirety, although some of them do still apply. Her TSH can never be used to monitor her thyroid treatment, for example, because it will always be low, and any doctor who tried to monitor treatment using TSH should be complained about immediately. Doctors will always have to use her Free T4 and, hopefully, will measure her Free T3 as well.
Allsortwrong, could you please describe a little bit how you got diagnosed? People post on the forum quite often with thyroid blood tests that suggest central hypothyroid, but it seems almost impossible to get a diagnosis.
How did you go about getting a diagnosis for secondary hypothyroidism because of your pituitary gland? I'm pretty sure that's what I have after several at home blood tests but I'm getting nowhere with my GP!
same here I'm battling to get diagnosed with secondary too...any advice is great
hello to you all and thank you for your help. I had radiotherapy for an optic nerve glioma 40 years ago and it stabilised the tumour which i have a review for every year. There was always the mention that in later life the radiotherapy will have damaged the pituitary as it lies directly below the optic chiasm. The very first test they did many years ago was insulin tolerance but I understand that was ok. since then I have had a few adrenal tests done because of the tachycardia but I was diagnosed with Ehlers Danlos syndrome with auto nomic dysfuncton which complicates things a bit. MRI scan showed that the pituitary is not at normal size so I have been having the short synacthen test for the past three years, each one was a small elevation from the baseline blood test and this year it was so blunted that the endo called to start me on hydrocortisone straight away. my medichecks tests showed that I was within the axis for hypothyroid I think thats correct. The newest problems being brittle nails dry skin cold and various other odd little things. I also get severe right sided nose bleeds, this year so far I have lost 10 pints of blood so am waiting for surgery to put an arterial clip in my head. The bleeds are not coming from my nose, just exiting that way, I have always wondered if my pituitary is bleeding, maybe a crazy idea? but the pain in my head and pressure build up is huge, it the goes once the bleed settles. I have all my tests results out at the moment because I am in the middle of transferring from DLA to PIP so I will post them and see if anyone can make sense of it all.
Thankyou all so much for your input, i am feeling a bit lost.
MPV is more common with autoimmune thyroid disease
Have you had BOTH TPO and TG thyroid antibodies tested and had ultrasound scan of your thyroid
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