Tania Smith on age influence on diagnosis and treatment

[diogenes]

This new blog discusses the changing relationship of pituitary and thyroid hormones with age. It also notes that, to cover more patients as "within range ie euthyroid" by combining TSH from two different methods has led the Alberta health group in Canada to widen the range for TSH up to 6.5. This is strictly forbidden as each TSH test has its own distortions and dissimilarities somewhere in the ranges.

Age bias may hide hypothyroidism under a normal TSH

 BY THYROIDPATIENTSCA on JULY 22, 2022 • ( 0 )

[Gingernut44]

How much worse can the treatment/non treatment get. What happened to “first do no harm”?

[DippyDame]

Hail Tania!!

She concludes

Therefore, science-based thyroid education and clinical sensitivity are the only ways forward.

How often have we said that here!

thyroidpatients.ca/2022/07/...

Wrongly treated we "ancients" will fall off our perches sooner....!!!

[humanbean]

Since many doctors now consider a TSH of 10 to indicate "mild hypothyroidism", what results for Free T4 and Free T3 would a doctor expect to see with a TSH of 10 (if they ever actually tested them)?

[Gingernut44 in reply to humanbean]

I’m afraid they wouldn’t have a clue as FT4 and FT3 aren’t usually measured even after the TSH reaches 10.

[humanbean in reply to Gingernut44]

Yes, that's what I thought. I've seen people giving results for Free T4 and Free T3 that were similar to mine when I was first diagnosed as having subclinical hypothyroidism. The TSH quoted in one case was around 10, another person had a TSH of around 30. Mine never reached 6.

[Beau55 in reply to humanbean]

Humanbean, out of interest what were your ft4/ft3 levels at before diagnosis with a TSH of 6 if you don’t mind me asking? I’m interested!