I understood what you meant. I thank all of you for trying to enlighten me. I have so many different nuances going on, I think I'm going mad sometimes. Talking to people that have lived through it & come out sane on the other side, brings me peace. :-)
Thyroid antibodies will not attack other parts of the body; they only attack the thyroid. When the thyroid is destroyed, those antibodies will go into remission; they will not move on to other parts of your body, such as the heart.
Please be aware that when we are diagnosed with one autoimmune disease, there's a possibility that we will be diagnosed with another at some point - I have Hashimoto's and Pernicious Anemia - both autoimmune, but they don't involve the same antibodies.
I did go to a cardiologist, he was the one that performed the stress test EKG & Angiogram. My fear is that my autoimmune system is now targeting a DIFFERENT area (ie: my heart as well as thyroid). I realize that cardiologists don't always have a great knowledge of autoimmune disorders, so I wanted to come to my follow up appt with good questions that will make him think & make good decisions with me. Thank you for helping me with this mess. :-)
When the rheumatologist diagnosed the Hashi's, he did so based on the antibodies to the thyroid. My thyroid tests that I get every few months are still in the normal range, although I don't know the exact numbers. Apparently they are suffiicient to not need any medication for that. I did have a ultrasound of my thyroid by an ENT, who confirmed Thyroidititis.
My post-angiogram consult with the cardio is on Tuesday. I just wanted to show up with more informed questions, if possible. Thank you for taking your time to help me.
I have Hashi's and was in hospital around 3 years ago with an abnormal EKG too. I spent a week in hospital for them to send me home saying everything was 'normal'
I since have had a Holter Monitor which records your heart for 24 hours and any abnormalities. I have Atrial Fibrilliation. Not overly serious but enough to scare the daylights out of me when I get bad heart palpitations!
I believe it is caused partly by my sleep apnoea and also the Hashi's I had undiagnosed for 15 years causing damage.
Did you see a cardiologist?
Sometimes the medication we take can be skewiff for a while and cause heart problems too.
When you were diagnosed with Hashi's were you put on med? If so, what med and what dosage? Were there other thyroid tests done - such as, TSH, FT3 and FT4? If so, what were the results and the lab's reference ranges? The reference ranges vary from lab to lab, so must come from your own report.
It's almost never safe to make assumptions. What did your doctor say?
I had hyper stage before getting my hypo stage and I believe it was in that time being hyper that my heart started to play up. Yes, Barb you are right, Hashi's per se is not the cause of heart arrythmia's but auto-immune disease of another type can.
I have transient atrial fibrilliation and of course, Hashi's, so when we generalise our illnesses it can appear they are connected. Not having my ongoing pain in the rear end of an illness fully understood and diagnosed, all I can say is not getting answers like Hashimess is going through is a worse pain in the rear end!