Posted by blueberry on May 10, 2006, at 17:26:43
In reply to anxiety and adrenal function and wet fingernails.., posted by Racer on May 10, 2006, at 13:11:38
Hi Racer,
I've been through this whole process and can tell you a little about it.
Thyroid...the TSH test they give you is worthless. What you need is the full thyroid panel, which includes TSH, T3free, T4free, reverse T3, and the two thyroid antibodies. There can be all kinds of thyroid problems including autoimmune diseases and hidden conditions that will not show up with just TSH.
You can get a diurnal saliva test for cortisol and dhea done yourself from mailorder labs available on the web. A place I used was idealhealth.com, but there are others if you do a search. Idealhealth provided some neat graphs to show my 4 saliva test results and how they compared to average normal results. My results showed adrenal fatigue. My GP was skeptical but I think wanted to cover his butt, so he sent me to an endocrinologist for the suppression test. That came back normal.
The endocrinologist told me that contrary to what naturopaths say about adrenal fatigue being able to recover, he said it is usually permanent.
The saliva tests are actually a waste I think. Really all you need is the suppression test. That will show clearly whether anything is truly wrong or not, and if so, what the next step is. I had to really beg and plead my GP to send me for the test. I had to remind him it's my money and my body and I want this done. I think at that point he realized he had to cover his butt just in the remote case that something was wrong and he had refused my forceful requests. (they think in terms of lawsuits, and I'm convinced he sent me for the test to avoid guilt down the road if it was later discovered I really did have a problem)
poster:blueberry
thread:642173
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060510/msgs/642284.html