| Thyroid
eye disease is described on the sites below. However, there has been tremendous
progress in understanding the condition which is very important and not
emphasised
- the eye disease is up to 7 times worse
in smokers (Bartalena
98), Premmel
1993.
That is SEVEN times worse. So do try to stop! The figure relates
to approximately 20 cigarettes a day.
Passive smoking, that is if your husband smokes 20 cigarettes a day,
means that you will get 25% of his smoke....so this if he smokes 20/day
and you are in the same room much of the time, your eye disease will
be THREE times as severe as if he did not smoke.
- The eye disease is due to
abnormal TSH receptors on the surface of the cells surrounding your
eyes. Why does this matter?
TSH is thyroid stimulating hormone, and is made in your pituitary gland.
The pituitary gland makes more TSH when the amount of thyroid hormone
in your blood drops to very low levels.
If anyone is short of thyroid hormone, that is if you have had radiation
treatment or a high dose of anti-thyroid drugs, or you become short
of it naturally, the pituitary gland makes more TSH.
But the more TSH there is, the more that will reach the tissues around
your eye, and then the more the muscles and fat around your eye will
swell up, pushing your eye forward.
This is because the TSH makes the cells swell up.
You therefore need a low TSH level, or at least one that healthy
people have. Therefore you will need blood checks to see that you
have enough thyroid hormone in your bloodstream. By keeping the right
amount of thyroid hormone in your blood your eyes are much less likely
to swell up.
If your thyroid hormone levels are low your doctor will prescribe
more thyroxine tablets.
Thyroid Eye Disease is usually Graves disease...basically
these terms have the same meaning. EUGOGO.
The like below explain the condition in more detail.
- Radioactive iodine may
cause thyroid
eye disease progression . Risks may be reduced by corticosteroid
therapy starting just before the radioactive iodine. Radioactive
iodine is best avoided with newly diagnosed disease (Graves
disease) and active eye disease (Drug & Ther Bulletin 2006).
- There is a genetic contribution to the inflammation (Eye
2010).
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