Hypothyroidism: When the clock slows down and the furnace goes out

Your thyroid is a butterfly shaped gland located in the throat area. Although it is a small organ, it performs many very important functions such as regulating your metabolism and body temperature, nervous system, heart function, muscle and bone growth, digestive function, female reproduction and lactation, and skin function.  And even though it performs many essential body activities, your thyroid may be the most vulnerable to diet, lifestyle and environmental influences.

Hypothyroid is a condition where the thyroid is underfunctioning.  Symptoms can come on slowly before one realizes that there is a medical problem. Common symptoms (of varying degrees) are:

• Fatigue
• Poor or sluggish digestion
• Poor skin and hair quality
• Changes in voice or speech
• Facial puffiness, especially around the eyes, drooping eyelids
• Infertility
• Short menstrual cycles with heavy periods
• Irritable or dull moods
• Weight gain due to lowered metabolism and fluid retention
• Forgetfulness
• Enlarged heart, murmurs and slowed heart rate
• Senstivity to cold or extreme temperature

In conventional medicine the thyroid function is tested by measuring blood levels of TSH, thyroid stimulating hormone. Your doctor may also test for T4 and T3.  TSH is a hormone made by the pituitary that signals the thyroid to produce T4 and some T3 hormone.  T3 is the active form of the hormone and 80% of it comes from the conversion of T4 to T3 in the liver.  When the body makes enough T4 and T3, the brain reduces the production of TSH.  When there isn’t enough, the brain makes excess TSH.  Thus on the test, TSH is high in hypothyroid.

In conventional medicine, when TSH is elevated beyond the normal range, the patient is usually prescribed thyroid hormone.  The hormone provides T4 in most cases. So the body still has to convert it to active T3.

Diet and environmental factors that can aggravate hypothyroid:

Diet deficient in minerals and amino acids. The thyroid needs different vitamins, minerals and amino acids in order for it to do its job.
Personal exposure to radiation, especially those working in a clinic or hospital setting or those who have had many upper body x-rays.
Stress

Subclinical hypothyroid

The range of normal on a blood test is 0.40 – 5.00 – a very large range indeed.  As a naturopath, part of our treatment approach is to recognize individual biochemistry, each person has their own required levels of hormones, vitamins and minerals that may be higher or lower than the general population.  This is often the case with thyroid levels.  It is also important to measure T4 and T3 to determine if the thyroid is producing enough hormone according to the amount of TSH produced and if the body is converting enough of the T4 hormone to active T3.  So you can see there are varying interpretations that are possible from thyroid function tests.

The Naturopathic Approach

Even though your TSH levels may be within the normal range, if it is towards one end or the other, you could be suffering from a subclinical condition, meaning the doctor won’t investigate further and no medications or further action prescribe.  But the symptoms of subclinical hypothyroid can be as bad as overt hypothyroid, especially fatigue, weight gain, infertility, depressed mood, disturbed digestion.