I123 Thyroid Uptake Scan...Do I really need this?

[veroki]

so the endo that i met with wrote me a script to take to the hospital to have the I123 Thyroid uptake scan. ive been putting it off for 2 weeks because i was trying to wean my daughter off of breastfeeding. now that ive read more about treating my hyperthyroid with RAI (which is what the endo suggested) ive come to the decision that im not interested. so im probably looking at surgery. do i still need this scan? id prefer not to have anything radioactive in my body. is this scan only relevant if you are having RAI? has anyone had any negative symptoms from doing this?  

[stella5349]

There is a formulated doseage that is different from the I123 scan to the I131 ablation procedure your doctor is advising.

The I123 is the "examined" iodine needed to use to preform the scan to see the actual structure of the thyroid to really know if autoimmune Graves is present. Its a safe procedure in the aspect of medical research but it is not "side-effect" fool proof.

Many do have slight to moderate reaction to the injection as I for one can say it did bring on some odd symptoms after. There is a post on the board similiar that expleins this experience more in depth with I-123.

Here's the tab:

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/Thyroid-Disorders/Does-everyone-get-ultrasound-or-scan/show/1344727

Treating hyperthyroid and treating autoimmune Graves should be somewhat 2 different senerios. Have your started actually from the 1 test and had the TSI Graves test to see if your hyperthyroidism is carrying Graves antibodies? Or has your doctor bypassed the autoimmune testing and gone right to seeing if Graves is present on the uptake scan?

If you haven't had the blood test and seriously do not want to go forward yet until other options have determine things you should make sure the TSI test was done first - prior to I123. That is the way all the bases are covered when things are routinly being looked at.

Now the flip side of it all is you... and your symptoms... Having reagrdless, hyperthyroid or even Graves is - and can be a urgent issue and how your are reponding to the condition is vitally important to these decisions being made.

Blunty if you are miserable - ( ie cardio issues and extremely hyper) the doctor may be saving you some time and going right to I123 to get to the root of it all quick and then proceed with ablation I131 to stop the clinical emergency you are in.

But if you are not in critical hyper with symptoms or your doctors opinion doesn't require you to get immediate ablation and hasn't done the TSI - you can stress to them that you want that lab just to know of autoimmune is causing this issue of hyper for you.

It sounds like you just had a baby too and I believe you reading alot is definately improtant on how birth can temporarily spike and dip thyroid function. Its not uncommon after a birth to have abnormal  levels either way - so take that into consideration prior to to permantely ablating then gland and depending on medications to regulate you. There is alot of great information out there after a pregnancy that shows the instability of both hyperthyroid/ Graves autoimmune/ hypothyroid and Hashi's that you can utilize to see really where the best outcome can be for you.

[Kristina538]

I had the 1123 uptake scan;  I must admit I was scared but there was absolutely no problems/no after-effects; nothing.   In hindsight it was no different than having an x-ray.

From the uptake scan, they were able to rule out other thyroid disease and confirm that I had one hot nodule.  (The thyroid is the only organ in the body that takes up iodine; in my case, it was only the nodule in the thyroid that took it up on the 1123 scan; showing that my nodule caused the 'hyper' and the rest of my thyroid was suppressed because of it).  

I understand that 1123 can assist in a good diagnosis.  I have now been given the option for surgery or RAI, and can see complications with both, so have chosen RAI (at this stage).