results. Can you clarify please.

[Daisydoo2]

Here are my last 3 results…

August 2023

T4 13.4 (11 - 22)

TSH 3.13 (0.27-4.2)

Feb 2024

TSH 5.03 (0.35-5.5)

August 2024

T4 14.6 (11-22)

TSH 0.94 (0.27-4.2)

You lovely people have suggested I need to increase my dose (currently 75) but could you just explain what these results show so I can go ‘armed’ to the GP?

Many thanks

[greygoose]

August 2024? Do you do time travel?

FT4: 14.6 pmol/l (Range 11 - 33) 16.36%

OK, so your TSH is good-ish, but it's not just about the TSH, which is unreliable and varies throughout the day (might be a good idea to add that because they don't seem to understand that). So, we have to look at the FT4 - after all, what you're taking, levo, is T4, so it seems logical to see how much of it is getting into your blood.

Your FT4 in-range, certainly, but it's not just about being in-range, because the ranges are so wide. It's about being in the right place within the range to make you well. And an FT4 just 16.36% through the range is not high enough to make anyone well.

Euthyroid - i.e. someone with no thyroid problems - is usually around 50% through the range. But, hypos, because of their extra challenges, usually need their levels higher than euthyroid, say about 70-75% through the range. So, you need an increase in dose to get your FT4 up there.

More importantly, as I'm sure you know, T4 is basically a storage hormone that doesn't do much until it is converted into T3, the active hormone. The T3 percentage through the range, in someone on levo mono-therapy, will automatically be lower than the FT4, because 100% of T4 is never converted to T3, only about 30%. So, your FT3 is going to be even lower and that is what causes symptoms.

Doctors know next to nothing about interpreting blood test results because they don't learn how to do it in med school - yes, incredible, isn't it. Which is one of the reasons they tend to make such a muck-up of treating hypo - which they know, next to nothing about either. Which is why we have to understand it all ourselves and be our own advocates;

[Daisydoo2 in reply to greygoose]

Thank you for explaining all that.

I meant July 2024 not August!!! lol.

How do you work out how much through the range you are?

Thanks

[greygoose in reply to Daisydoo2]

We have a handy calculator:

thyroid.dopiaza.org/

[Sleepman]

How do you feel? Do you have any issues on this dose?

[Daisydoo2 in reply to Sleepman]

Hi. Not feeling great. Tired, stomach issues, hives. Just got to work out if it’s the Hashi’s or something else.