Can your tsh fluctuate

To cope with the metabolic demands of pregnancy , the mother's thyroid gland undergoes noticeable modifications. Because the baby requires additional thyroid stimulating hormones, in most cases, your TSH will decrease, and T3 and T4 will increase. However, in some women, the increase can be too drastic, leading to hyperthyroidism.

In others, your T3 and T4 may not increase enough; this is common with hypothyroid women. As thyroid hormone levels change during pregnancy, the hormone replacement dose may change with them. An expecting mom should test their thyroid hormone levels every month in the first half of pregnancy and may be checked less often during the second half of pregnancy.

The seasons - spring, summer, fall, winter - can affect your thyroid. Interestingly, TSH increases during the colder winter months and decreases during the summer months. In the winter, your body may have difficulty keeping up with its hormonal needs, resulting in the TSH rise. Work with your doctor to manage thyroid level fluctuations. Finding the right treatment and the proper dosage is a step-by-step process that takes time and requires monitoring. Paloma Health helps to make that process easy and personalized.

Free guide Claim your free guide to thyroid meds Check your mailbox for your guide. Why Thyroid Hormone Levels Fluctuate Thyroid hormone levels can progress or stabilize as time goes on. Medically Reviewed by:. Something went wrong while submitting the form.

Thank you! Your submission has been received! Request a phone call. Endocr Res. Those with PH were all taking L-thyroxine. Median TSH in the subclinical hypothyroid group was 5. Median TSH in the primary hypothyroid group taking L-thyroxine was 3. Practice Implications That there is a circadian rhythm to thyroid hormones is not surprising as the hormonal milieu is associated with diurnal rhythms.

Thirty-five years ago, fluctuating TSH levels were demonstrated and found to be at their highest in the middle of the night. Interestingly, the current abstract also found that higher morning TSH levels were associated with greater variability later in the day. The question they pose is whether a tighter range of TSH 0. A diagnosis could be missed in 3 out of every 10 patients with subclinical hypothyroidism if the blood draw is done later in the day. There is a continuing debate about what the upper end of the reference range for TSH should be.

When an upper end of 2. This implies that a diagnosis could be missed in 3 out of every 10 patients with subclinical hypothyroidism if the blood draw is done later in the day. This is somewhat expected, as all of these patients were taking L-thyroxine. When the upper limit of TSH was set at 4. When this upper limit was changed to 2. Not surprisingly, when the TSH upper limit is 2. This study implies that it is best for patients to have their blood drawn in the morning.

Currently, whether a clinician uses the 4. A number of companies manufacture thyroid hormone, and their products are slightly different from each other. Your body can react differently to the different brands. You skip pills. Although the medication you take — T4 thyroxine , the main hormone made by the thyroid — stays in your blood a long time, missing a few days in a row, or consistently missing now and then over time, could affect your test results, says Norma Lopez, MD , an associate professor of endocrinology at the Stritch School of Medicine at Loyola University Chicago.

You take the wrong dosage. Say you are scheduled to take micrograms mcg a week mcg once a day but miss two pills and end up taking only mcg. Your body will react to the lower dosage.

The same goes if you take too much. Says Dr. One day you take your pill on an empty stomach, say, and the next you take it with a meal. The best time of day to take thyroid medication is generally when you wake up in the morning and can take it on an empty stomach, according to the ATA. But the most important thing is to be consistent and take your medication at the same time and in the same way every day, the ATA says.

If you always take your pill with meals, you may need a higher dosage than if you always take it without having eaten. You become pregnant. You still have to take your thyroid medication if you become pregnant. In fact, you might even need more because both you and your developing baby need it.

Like pregnancy, menopause can also affect your hormone levels. You take other medications. For example, starting or stopping oral contraceptives can make a difference in the dose of thyroid hormone you require, Dr. Davies says.