Slajd 1 HASHIMOTO’S DISEASE

Hashimoto’s disease is also called Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, chronic lymphocytic thyroiditis, or

autoi’mmune thyroiditis.

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What is actually hashimoto’s disease?
Hashimoto’s disease is an autoimmune disorder that can cause hypothyroidism, or
underactive thyroid. It is the most common thyroiditis type.
With this disease, your immune system attacks your thyroid.
The thyroid becomes damaged and can’t make enough thyroid hormones.
As you know Thyroid hormones are very important, they control how our body uses energy,
so they affect almost every organ in your body.
Without enough thyroid hormones, many of our body’s functions slow down.

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How common is that disease?
It is considered as the most popular autoimmune disease, the most common endocrine
disorder and also the most common cause of hypothyroidism. In The United States it affects
about 5 people out of 100. In Poland it is estimated that nearly eight hundred thousand
people are ill. Also Hashimoto’s disease is at least 8 times more common in women than
men. it more often appears between 40 y.o and 60 y.o. It may be ge’netically de’termined,
so the chance of de’veloping Hashimoto’s disease increases if other family members have
the disease.

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What causes hashimoto’s disease?
In this topic researches are not clear in every case. But what we know is that In Hashimoto’s
disease, your immune system makes antibodies that attack the thyroid gland. Large numbers
of white blood cells build up in the thyroid. Lymphocytes make the antibodies that start the
autoimmune process and destroy the thyroid gland.

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Pictures show healthy thyroid gland and with hashimoto’s desease

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Symptoms
Many people have no symptoms at first. As the disease slowly progresses, the thyroid gets
larger and the front of the neck looks swollen. The enlarged thyroid is called goiter. The
goiter may create feeling of fullness in the throat. The next symptoms are connected with
hypothyroidism, such as:
 tiredness
 weight gain
 joint and muscle pain
 constipation
 dry, thinning hair
 heavy or irregular menstrual periods and problems becoming pregnant
  depression
 memory problems
 a slowed heart rate

(slajd 9)Pharmacological treatment isn’t necessary when thyroid gland isn’t enlarged and
level of thyroid hormones is normal. People with this disease have to monitoring their health
and examining regularly. It’s not possible to cure Hashimoto disease completely, it’s only
treated in a symptomatic way. The most common way of treatment is using levothyroxine (L-
T4). It’s reducing the volume of the goiter, prevents increasing the level of thyroid hormones
and normalising it. When the goiter gets bigger, doctor advise thyroi’dectomy which is
removing of thyroid gland.
Interesting facts (slajd 12)
•Smoking cigarettes lower antibodies attacking thyroid gland
•Lots of people thought that they have Hashimoto’s disease because they were tired all the
time, had dry and thin hair, problems with memory and gained on weight. Most of them just
didn’t sleep and eat well