Hello,
I thought I'd give a quick update as two days ago I had my first appointment with an endocrinologist. I paid for a private appointment with a doctor on the ThyroidUK list.
I had written her a brief 'covering letter' which my GP included with my referral. Anyway, apparently I looked terrified when I went into her consulting room as she took one look at me and just said "Yes!" - I was like, what? and she said "Yes, yes you can have T3!" π
Briefly, my history is that I have Hashimotos, and have been on Levo since January with no improvement - and blood tests were showing poor conversion. In July my T4 was at 120% through range and T3 just 38%.
So, the outcome of the appointment is that she's going to write to my GP to request that I am prescribed Liothyrinine on the NHS (!) - and if that fails, she will write me a private prescription. She did say that historically it has been difficult to get Lio in my area (Glasgow CCG) but that since my GP has indicated she has a few patients on it, it may be possible and it has got to be worth a try.
Dose wise, she is keeping my Levo dose at 75mcg (that's what I've been taking since the above blood tests, which were on 100mcg), and is adding 2 x 5mcg of Liothyrinine. She wants me to do a blood test after 6-8 weeks on this dose and she'll then review to see where to go.
I asked her about where she aims for in terms of test results (obviously, as well as taking symptoms into account), and she says she likes to see T3 and T4 as high as possible in range without reducing TSH "too much below range, although it's ok to go a little below if the patient feels well".
It was also interesting (if somewhat galling) to hear her say unequivocally that my TSH of 3.5, around 8 years ago, was 'absolutely NOT fine', contrary of course to what I was told at the time by the GP.
Anyway, I hope this might be useful info for some of you and I will update on my progress as I go π