zeptember

Family health: Half of people with thyroid disorder don’t know it
Monday, January 26, 2009

What you should know

The thyroid is a gland in the front of the neck that makes thyroid hormones.

Thyroid hormones affect your metabolism — your body’s way of turning food into energy.

“Hypothyroidism” is a when your thyroid hormone levels are too low. Hypothyroidism might make you feel tired, fatigued, depressed or gain weight. Some people lose hair. Others have a hard time concentrating. Thyroid problems in senior citizens can cause memory loss or dementia. Dementia from low thyroid can be cured.

“Hyperthyroidism” is when your thyroid gland makes too much thyroid hormone. Hyperthyroidism can make you feel stressed, “hyper” or anxious. Your heart might race. You might get sweaty or shaky. Hyperthyroidism can also make you feel hot when others are cold. Weight loss and insomnia can be signs. Some patients develop eye problems.

Thyroid problems tend to affect women more than men. Also, the thyroid typically enlarges during pregnancy.

The risk of thyroid problems can be higher in certain families and in older people.

People with other health problems may also have a higher risk of thyroid problems. These health problems may include diabetes and autoimmune diseases such as psoriasis, multiple sclerosis or rheumatoid arthritis. Chemicals from smoking, toxins and other medicines can also increase risks.

Most thyroid problems are easy to treat. Your primary care provider can order a blood test called a TSH (Thyroid Stimulating Hormone) that can easily detect a thyroid problem.* If you have a problem, your doctor may refer you to a board-certified endocrinologist. Endocrinologists specialize in the body’s hormone and endocrine system.

Regular checkups with a physician may be important in managing a thyroid problem. A doctor can prescribe the right dose of the right thyroid medication to control most symptoms.

Retesting for thyroid problems can be helpful. Tests may be important if there has been a change in thyroid medicine or dosage, or if the patient takes a drug with the hormone estrogen or prenatal vitamins with iron.

Experts say that half of the people who have a thyroid disorder do not know about it. People may think that their weight problems or symptoms are just part of a normal daily life.

The right diet is important for production of thyroid hormone. The lack of iodine in the diet can lead to an enlarged thyroid. Most U.S. citizens get plenty iodine because iodized salt is a part of their daily diet.

Thyroid cancer is rare. It is one of the most curable cancers if discovered and treated early.

What you should do

Know the symptoms of an overactive and under-active thyroid. If you have symptoms of thyroid problems, get a checkup. Regular checkups are also very important if you have been diagnosed with a thyroid disorder.

If you have a thyroid disorder, get regular tests to check your TSH and other important factors affecting your health

Thyroid patients should see an endocrinologist if they have other health problems, like a swollen thyroid gland, diabetes or heart problems.

Don’t change your thyroid medicine dosage without the advice of your doctor.

Know when to take your thyroid medicine.

Talk to your doctor if you think your thyroid medicine is not helping you enough.

Make sure to have your doctor examine any new or unusual lump in your neck.

It is smart to get a thyroid function test if you are pregnant, especially if you have a higher risk for thyroid problems. An under-active thyroid in early pregnancy can increase the risk of miscarriage, stillbirth and premature delivery. A pregnant mother’s under-active thyroid can keep her new baby from growing normally.

Find a primary care doctor or clinic where you feel at home. A partnership with the care team in your medical home can be a way to get early treatment for health problems like thyroid disorders.

For more information

Go to healthymemphis.org/links for Web links to find out more about the thyroid gland, its problems and solutions.

* Yes but the problem with this article’s logic - while they mean well, they don’t know that a TSH blood test is usually full of FAIL unless you have a major thyroid problem. I was reading a website recently that said the following:

“TSH tests and blood tests are useful to help diagnose hypothyroidism but should not be used alone. Symptoms are the most important factor. It is rare that a blood chemistry panel shows your true condition because the values measured are only about 30% accurate. It is common for a hypothyroid person to have a completely normal thyroid panel. This is why the Thyroid Panel is considered by many to be inadequate.

It is common for a hypothyroid person to have a low TSH value, which is usually interpreted as hyperthyroidism, not the reverse, despite many symptoms of low thyroid (depression, dry skin, weight problems, chronic infections, female problems, hair loss, low blood sugar, and so on).

TSH tests are not as scientifically accurate as they need to be.

There is a sophisticated test to reveal even mild low thyroid and it is the TRH (Thyrotropin Releasing Hormone) test. This test requires an injection, followed by one or more blood draws at 15, 30 and 45 minute intervals. This test is accurate, but is expensive and inconvenient for both patient and the lab.” - allonhealth.com

And HOW many times have I mentioned in this journal that I KNOW I have a thyroid issue?
Let’s go back and find out, shall we?
November 10, 2008
March 10, 2008
March 9, 2008
March 5, 2008
March 4, 2008
March 4, 2008 (wherein I reveal my friend Nate as the person who has told me to push for better testing)
February 18, 2008
February 17, 2008
January 20, 2008
February 23, 2004 (in my old journal, in which I highlighted parts of a chapter out of an endometriosis book which I felt I should pay attention to for myself).

I am saving this article just in case.

While it is likely that I do not have Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA), which is what many people with Endometriosis are also prone to (since both are immune disorders), I DO for a fact have Osteoarthritis in my cervical spine and lumbar spine, with bulging discs in the cervical spine.

This year is the year I see specialists for my crunchy, painful knees, to get diagnosis on whether that too is osteoarthritis or what. I’ve had these really bad knees since I was a child, and was not allowed to do certain gym exercises through my entire schooling life.

So anyway, this article has RA info at the end, linking to the same genes they found for psoriasis, and I want to save it in case I need this article later on.

Scientists uncover new genetic variations linked to psoriasis
Public release date: 26-Jan-2009
Contact: Caroline Arbanas
Washington University School of Medicine

Two international teams of researchers have made significant gains in understanding the genetic basis of psoriasis, a chronic skin condition that can be debilitating in some patients. Their research, involving thousands of patients, is reported in two studies published this week in the advance online Nature Genetics.

“Taken together, the studies help us get closer to realizing the promise of personalized medicine,” says a senior author of both papers, Anne Bowcock, Ph.D., professor of genetics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. “Eventually, we hope to be able target treatments to psoriasis patients based on the genetic alterations that have contributed to their disease.”

The researchers found a number of new genetic variants that affect an individual’s risk of psoriasis. Their discoveries point to different biological pathways that underlie the disease and may eventually lead to targeted drugs and treatments that hit specific pathways, Bowcock says.

An estimated 7 million Americans have psoriasis, an autoimmune disease that occurs when the body’s immune cells mistakenly attack the skin. The condition is usually characterized by red, scaly skin patches that can be itchy, painful or both. Some 10 to 30 percent of patients with psoriasis develop psoriatic arthritis, which occurs when inflammation attacks the joints, causing pain and disability.

Both of the new studies looked for common variants in the genomes of psoriasis patients to uncover associations with the disease.

The first study, conducted in collaboration with the University of Michigan, the University of Utah and colleagues in Canada and Europe, focused on sites within the genome where a single unit of DNA is changed, called a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP). The researchers scanned nearly 450,000 SNPs in each of the genomes of 1,409 psoriasis patients and compared the DNA variations to those in 1,436 healthy controls.

They initially discovered 21 suspect variants associated with psoriasis. Going one step further, the investigators tested the validity of these variants in another group of 5,048 psoriasis patients and 5,041 controls. This revealed a shorter list of confirmed variants – seven – all of which appear to increase the risk of the disease. Five of the variants cluster in two distinct pathways that involve the signaling molecules IL-23 and NF-kappaB.

A second study of 2,831 patients with psoriasis looked for links between the disease and copy number variations, in which a gene is produced in multiple copies. Bowcock and her colleagues in Barcelona, Spain and elsewhere found that the absence of two skin genes – LCE3B and LCE3C – increases the risk of psoriasis.

Both genes normally are activated after an injury to the skin. The researches suspect the absence of the genes could lead to an inappropriate immune response, which may cause the inflammation that is a hallmark of the disease.

“Until now, all of the genes linked to psoriasis have been involved in the immune system,” Bowcock says. “But psoriasis is a disease of the immune system and the skin, and it makes sense that we would eventually find genes in the skin that are involved in the disease.”

The new variants uncovered by the researchers each make only a small contribution to the overall genetic risk of the psoriasis. Patients usually have a number of different genetic variations that increase their risk of the disease.

Also, Bowcock noted that some of the newly discovered variants have been associated with other inflammatory diseases such as Crohn’s disease and autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. Additional studies will help to tease apart the ways in which these diseases are connected at the level of DNA. This information will also aid in the search for more targeted drugs that can zero in on particular genetic defects that cause the diseases.

For Celiacs, ‘It’s A Long Road’
Sufferers Require Gluten-Free Diet
By Jeremy Hunt

HARRISONBURG - Deborah Howdyshell started having health problems a few months after her son was born in April of 2006.

It started with bladder infections, which she repeatedly contracted because the organ would not empty completely. There were other maladies, too - numbness in her feet and legs, and constipation and poor vision. Eventually her stomach stopped digesting food properly.

Howdyshell’s condition puzzled doctors, and nothing seemed to be the answer.

“Sometimes, you’re just like, ‘Gosh, am I a hypochondriac or something?’” said Howdyshell, 27, of Bridgewater. “For a couple of months, nobody did anything for me. I just kind of lived with the symptoms.”

In March, Howdyshell was diagnosed with a severe form of celiac disease, a genetic disorder. The disorder causes an autoimmune reaction that attacks the small intestine when people with the disease eat gluten, according to the University of Maryland Center for Celiac Research in Baltimore.

Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, rye and products derived from those grains.

Right now, there’s only one treatment for celiac disease: a strict gluten-free diet.

Most Celiacs Not Diagnosed

Before 2003, celiac disease was thought to be rare in the United States, affecting one in 10,000 to 15,000 people, doctors say.

More cases have been diagnosed in the U.S. since 2003 when a study came out that estimated one in 133 Americans have it.

Despite that, most people who have the disease have not been diagnosed, said Dr. Alessio Fasano, medical director of the Center for Celiac Research and co-author of the prevalence study.

Of the estimated 2.5 million to 3 million people in the U.S. that have the disease, no more than 150,000 have been diagnosed, according to estimates by advocates and doctors.

It took nearly two years for Howdyshell to be diagnosed.

During the interim, she saw a plethora of doctors who tested her for many illnesses, including multiple sclerosis and diabetes.

“It’s a long road, a very long road,” she said. “They actually told me I was diagnosed very soon.”

Fasano said the average time from the onset of symptoms to diagnosis is six to seven years in adults.

“It is the array of all the symptoms that makes it difficult to diagnose,” he said.

If untreated, he said, celiac disease can lead to major problems, including intestinal cancer, osteoporosis and organ damage.

Wide Range Of Symptoms

Symptoms include diarrhea, constipation, iron deficiency, malabsorption (the inability to absorb certain nutrients), gas and bloating, said Dr. Keith Vest, a gastroenterologist with Rockingham Memorial Hospital.

However, the disease can impact any part of the body, and the gamut of symptoms runs so long that saying some are more common than others can be misleading, Fasano said.

People who are “genetically susceptible” to celiac disease may not develop it until a stressor such as surgery causes the body to become intolerant to gluten, Fasano said.

That was the case with Howdyshell, whose condition was brought on by the stress of pregnancy.

Her symptoms got more severe over time.

Within the last couple of months, she ate ice cream that was mislabeled as being gluten free. Her throat swelled up, and she couldn’t eat for a month.

“I only ate a teaspoon full,” she said. “It immediately made me sick.”

Misconceptions, Challenges

A common misconception is that celiac disease only affects children, doctors and advocates say, but all ages from toddlers to the elderly have been diagnosed with it.

“It cuts across the age spectrum,” said Andrea Levario, executive director of the American Celiac Disease Alliance in Alexandria.

People often confuse celiac disease as a food allergy, doctors say, but it’s a completely different process.

Being an autoimmune disease, it triggers the immune system to attack normal tissue.

An Expensive Diet

The availability of gluten-free food has increased dramatically since 2003, according to advocates and reports.

But it is an expensive diet to follow, people with the disease say. Gluten-free products often cost three times as much as their counterparts.

There is also the risk that a product is labeled gluten free but still has the protein, as Howdyshell discovered.

Last month, Martin’s Food Markets pulled a brand of cereal from its shelves because some of the boxes had mistakenly been contaminated with a kind of wheat. The boxes had been labeled as wheat-free.

An investigation by the Chicago Tribune last fall found “an alarming number of products sold as allergen-free actually contain harmful amounts” of allergens like wheat.

‘A Big Deal’

The biggest challenge facing doctors and advocates, they say, is raising awareness of the disease, most notably in the medical field and among policymakers.

Public health officials don’t realize “that this is a big deal,” Fasano said. “The number of people with celiac disease outnumbers greatly [those with] other diseases we care very much about.”

Now that I’ve copied over everything having to do with george to my Living With Endometriosis website, I don’t post in detail about that stuff here anymore.

However, a new topic is developing - that of my many autoimmune illnesses. I’ve recently set up a Google news filter to catch anything autoimmune related, and this week’s catch has some stuff I want to save… but where? On this site? On the endometriosis site?
I guess until I can get all of this tied in and officially recognised by doctors, I guess I’ll just post news articles and whatnot about autoimmune-related stuff here.

Well I had two good days it seems of feeling better from being sick and from being on george.

I was on antibiotics from Friday, January 16th til Tuesday, January 20th. I got george on Monday, January 19th, which lasted til Friday, January 23rd. The pain however was over a day earlier, on Thursday.

So I had manic energy and felt great on Friday, January 23rd and Saturday, January 24th. My husband and I hung out with two friends on Friday, and hung out with 14 people for a birthday dinner on Saturday.
By Saturday morning, my throat was scratchy, and I chalked it up to having been around all the cigarette smoke on Friday.

(Sidenote: my gods, if I can’t handle the cigarette smoke blowing back in from a balcony from one person, I’m going to DIE in the U.K. on our honeymoon!)

However, by Sunday, I had a continuous runny nose, sneezing, and yellow sinus gunk all over again. What the hell!

I checked LiveJournal on Sunday and found out that a friend I’d sat next to the night before? She’d come down with the stomach flu.

She posted on LiveJournal on Monday that her entire family was now barfing several times and miserable from the stomach flu.

Last night, I got home from work after a full day of sneezing, runny nose, fatigue and baby watching, and just went to bed. I slept from about 7:45pm - 5:45am.

I just asked my friends who I saw on Friday if they’ve been sick - nope - they say they feel fine.

So because I already had a scratchy throat before even seeing my friends at dinner Saturday night, my re-infection probably happened via my workplace (the mother, the father, the baby or all three) or via my husband as a carrier (either through his workplace or through his bandmates).
It likely wasn’t helped by sitting next to a friend with developing flu, or across from another friend who still has a huge hacking cough and was on her 2nd round with pink eye that night…

Last possibility: I never had a bacterial sinus infection at all - and the antibiotics were useless - and this is just a continuation of what I already had.

SEE? THIS is why I need competent doctors to give thorough examination of me to rule out what I do and don’t have, instead of looking at me from across a room and declaring whether or not I have whichever illness!!! GAH.

In any case, my current symptoms:

• Sneezing
• alternating runny/stuffed nose
• small dry cough
• yellow phlegm
• headache that comes and goes
• eye pain and light sensitivity
• clogged ears again
• major fatigue

Many of my friends have had this virus since Thanksgiving. That’s two months!!!

I hate winter.