Multiple Endocrine Issues

[YourMama1966]

My husband went back to his endocrinologist today and came home discouraged and with more meds.  He's 51, has hypothyroidism, pituitary tumor, blood pressure problems, cholesterol problems, and pre-diabetic.  He exercises 5x per week, alternating between cardio and weights for about 2 hours at a time.  He runs 3-4 miles per day. He's had hypothyroidism for years.  His prolactin levels are moderately elevated, TSH levels are currently within limits with medication, but his blood pressure ranges from normal range to 165/110 with no rhyme or reason.  He's on blood pressure medicine, but sometimes his pressure gets too low, today 160/100.  Last month his cholesterol was 458, this month 210 with no medication.  Is there something his doctor may be overlooking that is causing such wide variance in his body's ability to regulate itself?  He was hospitalized for this for 5 days about 2 years ago.  They thought maybe he had an anuersym and couldn't find anything wrong.  We're stuck for answers or solutions

[Jules77733]

By the way, I was just wondering what you meant by 160/100 being "too low" for his blood pressure? I'm not really 100% sure of the appropriate ranges for BP in every age group, but I thought that was a little on the high end...

Mine was normally 115/85 until I got sick a few months ago; now, it's 98/65 and the doctors are still saying this is normal but low because I'm "young".

[kitty9309]

The other things aside (though I am not making light of them)- what is his current TSH?

It should fall between 0.5 and 2.0 according to the ATA. This is the recommended target level for those on meds for hypothyroidism. If it is in the high end of the normal range, it can still cause HBP and high cholesterol.

Here is the link for that info:

http://www.thyroid.org/patients/brochures/Hypothyroidism%20_web_booklet.pdf

Diabetes can go along with thyroid disease.

But perhaps the pituitary tumor (did he have an MRI?) is the cause of all of it???

[Jules77733]

What type of pituitary tumor is it? Has it been shown to grow?

I'm guessing it's at least secreting prolactin (a prolactinoma), but these things tend to secrete more than one hormone--what are his ACTH, TSH, GH, FSH, LH, and ADH levels? These are all hormones secreted by the pituitary, and I imagine he's had these levels monitored at one time or another.

I really think that pituitary tumor is causing a lot of these problems...ADH is secreted by the anterior lobe of the pituitary and improper secretion of this results in diabetes. Cholesterol increases are a result of the thyroid problems, which are likely a result of the pituitary tumor, in his case. Blood pressure is dependent on the volume of the blood, which can be affected by water content, which can be affected by ADH.........if this makes sense. Also, hypothyroidism has been known to cause high or low blood pressure (I've found sites that have said both, though it typically tends to cause high blood pressure more so than low blood pressure).

Has the doctor talked about having the pituitary tumor removed?