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Lithium lovers and thyroid levels...

Posted by psyclist123 on October 28, 2009, at 10:46:57

Low thyroid hormone levels are not good for you.

A.G. Awad, associate professor of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto says the following:

"An underactive thyroid can lead to progressive loss of interest and initiative, slowing of mental processes, poor memory for recent events, fading of the personality's colour and vivacity, general intellectual deterioration, depression with a paranoid flavour, and eventually, if not checked, to dementia and permanent harmful effects on the brain. In instances of each condition, some persons have been wrongly diagnosed, hospitalised for months, and treated unsuccessfully for psychosis."

Lithium, used to treat bipolar disorder, can interfere with the manufacture of thyroid hormones and can result in hypo-thyroidism.

I take Lithium at 800 mg nocte.

I suffer from the symptoms outlined above by Dr Awad.

My free T4 is down the bottom of the scale, chronically so.

I want to increase my thryroid levels and have been taking kelp tablets containing 150 ug of Iodine, three tablets a day. When I was also taking multi- vitamins containing Selenium this resulted in an improvement in my T4 from 11 pmol/L to 13 pmol/L [on a euthyroid scale of 10 to 22]. The statistics show that for adult males serum concentrations of FT4 were 15.4 +/- 2.32 pmol/L (mean +/- SD). These figures were found by the manufacturers of the assaying equipment used to measure thyroid levels. When I wasn't taking any Selenium my T4 went back to 12 pmol/L. [You probably use different scales of measurement in the States.]

Thyroid health is really, really important. Can anyone offer any comment? I think I am particularly susceptible to low thyroid hormone levels. BTW I am 57 years old.


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URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20091021/msgs/923076.html