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normal variation in TSH
How much can TSH vary in a person from day to day? I had a TSH of 1.24 one day, and 0.42 a few days later. My doctor is trying to tell me that is fine and normal. That seems like a terribly large shift in such a short time. Also she said even with 0.42, I'm still in range. My symptoms also match hyperthyroidism...
TSH can vary substantially from day to day, and even intra-day. It's also affected by the time of day the blood was drawn.
Were other tests run besides TSH? TSH is a pituitary hormone. Your pituitary produces TSH as a "messenger" to your thyroid to produce more thyroid hormones (T3 and T4, most importantly). Free T3 and free T4 are the tests that measure the levels of these thyroid hormones. If you have not had FT3 and FT4, you should request them immediately. They give a much more accurate assessment of what your thyroid is doing than TSH does.
Symptoms are all-important. If you are having hyper symptoms, then you are hyper, no matter what your bloodwork says.
In addition to the FT3 and FT4, it would be a good idea to have antibody testing to see if you have an autoimmune thyroid disease (Hashimoto's or Grave's). Thse tests are called TPOab, TGab and TRab.
The frees and the antibody tests will give you a much better initial look at your thyroid function and guide you to further testing (if necessary).
Don't put up with a doctor who is ignoring your symptoms. And don't put up with a doctor who only tests TSH...that's dangerous and irresponsible practice in my book.
Were other tests run besides TSH? TSH is a pituitary hormone. Your pituitary produces TSH as a "messenger" to your thyroid to produce more thyroid hormones (T3 and T4, most importantly). Free T3 and free T4 are the tests that measure the levels of these thyroid hormones. If you have not had FT3 and FT4, you should request them immediately. They give a much more accurate assessment of what your thyroid is doing than TSH does.
Symptoms are all-important. If you are having hyper symptoms, then you are hyper, no matter what your bloodwork says.
In addition to the FT3 and FT4, it would be a good idea to have antibody testing to see if you have an autoimmune thyroid disease (Hashimoto's or Grave's). Thse tests are called TPOab, TGab and TRab.
The frees and the antibody tests will give you a much better initial look at your thyroid function and guide you to further testing (if necessary).
Don't put up with a doctor who is ignoring your symptoms. And don't put up with a doctor who only tests TSH...that's dangerous and irresponsible practice in my book.
Just found a few articles which say that hyperthyroidism actually lowers testosterone...
Just started using Androgel, since my testosterone is really low (140).
Other than that, no meds.
Every morning at 4:30am, I get woken up. All my symptoms match hyper perfectly. They get progressively worse over the next 3 hours or so. Then they get slowly better over the course of the day. The symptoms are at their minimum (not gone) at evening.
I also think all my blood test where TSH came back normal were in the later part of the day. Not sure when my 0.42 blood test was taken. But I was in the hospital because my symptoms were so bad at that time.
When I first got to the hospital, they gave me a shot of dexamethasone. I got ridiculously cold for about two hours. Then I actually started to feel pretty decent. Until the next morning when it was really bad again. Doing a google search, looks like dex supresses TSH. Not terribly sure what that means.
Other than that, no meds.
Every morning at 4:30am, I get woken up. All my symptoms match hyper perfectly. They get progressively worse over the next 3 hours or so. Then they get slowly better over the course of the day. The symptoms are at their minimum (not gone) at evening.
I also think all my blood test where TSH came back normal were in the later part of the day. Not sure when my 0.42 blood test was taken. But I was in the hospital because my symptoms were so bad at that time.
When I first got to the hospital, they gave me a shot of dexamethasone. I got ridiculously cold for about two hours. Then I actually started to feel pretty decent. Until the next morning when it was really bad again. Doing a google search, looks like dex supresses TSH. Not terribly sure what that means.
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