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Adverse Childhood Experiences and Hashimoto’s Disease

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R
Autoimmune Paleo Diet and Hashimoto’s
ecently I have been researching the fascinating field of childhood trauma and Disease
uncovered an interesting link between adverse childhood experiences and
The Hashimoto’s Disease and SIBO
Hashimoto’s disease.
Connection
One of the studies I discovered came out of a large, important public health
Can Blastocystis Hominis Cause Hashimoto’s
study, The ACE Study, but it focused specifically on cumulative childhood stress
Disease?
and autoimmune disease in adults.
Can Thiamine Improve Hashimoto’s Disease-
What are adverse childhood experiences? Related Fatigue?

Healing Hashimoto’s Disease with Andrea

Adverse childhood experiences, or ACEs, are experiences that expose individuals under the age of
Nakayama
18 to childhood traumatic stress. These experiences include physical, emotional or sexual abuse;
witnessing domestic violence; growing up with household substance abuse, mental illness, parental
divorce, and/or the incarceration of a household member.

Who was studied?

A group of 15,357 adult Kaiser Permanente health maintenance organization members available for
follow-up through 2005 was involved in this study. They were selected from the ACE Study, which
was performed from 1995 to 1997.

These individuals are interesting because while many studies have looked at inner-city poor people of
color, this study’s participants were mostly white, middle and upper-middle class college-educated
San Diegans with good jobs and great health care.

This highly educated population was made up of 40 percent college graduates. Of the remaining
individuals, 36% had some college education, 17% were high school graduates (i.e., they had 12 The Dr. Hedberg Show is a podcast series of
years of education). Only 7% had not completed high school. my best interviews, teleconferences and all of
my original solo productions.
What did they measure?
The study authors looked at the data from the ACE Study and created an ACE Score that included
eight types of interrelated and co-occurring exposure to childhood adversity to measure cumulative
childhood traumatic stress. So, the greater the number of adverse experiences, the higher the score.

The ACE Study Questionnaire is very simple and includes the following 10 questions.

“While you were growing up, during your first 18 years of life:

1) Did a parent or other adult in the household often …

Swear at you, insult you, put you down, or humiliate you?

or

Act in a way that made you afraid that you might be physically hurt?

2) Did a parent or other adult in the household often …

Push, grab, slap, or throw something at you?

or

Ever hit you so hard that you had marks or were injured?

3) Did an adult or person at least 5 years older than you ever…

Touch or fondle you or have you touch their body in a sexual way?

or

Try to or actually have oral, anal, or vaginal sex with you?

4) Did you often feel that …

No one in your family loved you or thought you were important or special? or

Your family didn’t look out for each other, feel close to each other, or support each other?

5) Did you often feel that …

You didn’t have enough to eat, had to wear dirty clothes, and had no one to protect you?

or

Your parents were too drunk or high to take care of you or take you to the doctor if you needed it?

6) Were your parents ever separated or divorced?

7) Was your mother or stepmother:

Often pushed, grabbed, slapped, or had something thrown at her?

or

Sometimes or often kicked, bitten, hit with a fist, or hit with something hard?

or

Ever repeatedly hit over at least a few minutes or threatened with a gun or knife?

8) Did you live with anyone who was a problem drinker or alcoholic or who used street drugs?

9) Was a household member depressed or mentally ill or did a household member attempt suicide?

10) Did a household member go to prison?”

If the answer was yes to any of these questions, the respondents were allocated one point.

Next, the authors looked at those scores and compared them with the risk of 21 different autoimmune
diseases that resulted in hospitalization. These illnesses included Graves’ disease, diabetes, irritable
bowel syndrome, multiple sclerosis, Addison’s disease, and Hashimoto’s thyroiditis.

What did the study results show?

The study revealed that eight of the study participants had Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, and all of them
were women.

In the study, women were 50% more likely than men to be hospitalized with an autoimmune disease.
In fact, they were 50% more likely to suffer from any autoimmune disease within the same Th2-type
grouping that Hashimoto’s belongs to.

Compared to the individuals with no ACEs, those with more than two ACEs were 80% more likely to
be hospitalized because of a Th2-type autoimmune disease.

And with every extra ACE added to their score, participants were 20% more at risk of suffering from a
Th2-type autoimmune disease.

Interestingly, the study also showed that the relationship between the ACE Score and autoimmune
disease hospitalization was stronger among younger adults. In fact, those between the ages of 19
and 64 were twice as likely to be hospitalized as individuals over 65 years old.

What causes this relationship?

The reasons behind these findings is an interesting point of discussion. Around the same time the
ACE Study was being done, parallel research was being performed on children’s brains and how they
are affected by toxic stress.

Pediatric and neuroscientist researchers from Harvard, Rockefeller, and the Child Trauma Academy
found that when children are overloaded with stress hormones, they have difficulties learning at
school, trusting adults and developing healthy relationships with their peers.

To relieve their anxiety, depression, guilt, shame and other emotions, they easily turn to biochemical
solutions, such as nicotine, alcohol, and drugs. They may find other ways to escape their problems,
too, like engaging in high-risk sports, sex with various partners, over-achievement/work or overeating.

Research from that time also shows that childhood abuse changes the brain and brain waves. The
brains of severely sexually abused women and maltreated children are actually smaller in certain
areas.

The relationship between stress and autoimmune disease is still being researched, and larger studies
are needed in this field. However, we do know that there is a connection between immune disorders,
emotional disorders, and mental disorders. What we don’t understand yet, is why these connections
occur, though some have further speculated that 80% of autoimmune disease patients are women
because female individuals respond to stress differently than males because they produce more
estrogen.

Dr. Hedberg’s Comments

During the research that compared autoimmune diseases and ACE Scores, only patients who were
hospitalized were studied. This leads to the question: what about the individuals that didn’t go to the
hospital due to Hashimoto’s or another autoimmune disease during that time?

From my experience, most patients visit their doctor at a clinic and aren’t hospitalized by
Hashimoto’s, though some cases naturally result in hospitalization.

This was recognized by the authors of the study, who said of autoimmune diseases: “Autoimmune
diseases were identified through hospitalizations and not outpatient data. Future studies may be
strengthened through the use of clinical data because most autoimmune diseases are diagnosed
through outpatient visits.”

Next, we must consider those in the general population who never receive Hashimoto’s diagnosis.
The American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists (AACE) estimated that in the United States
approximately 13 million people, or 4.78% of the population, have undiagnosed thyroid dysfunction. If
true, this would represent approximately half of those with the disease.

The study also omitted patients over the age of 65.

However, this study is very useful and the findings that relate to ACE Scores appear to be very
accurate. The estimated prevalence of childhood exposures to adverse experiences that the study
revealed were almost identical to those reported in surveys of the general population.

They found that 16% of the men and 25% of the women met the case definition for contact sexual
abuse. A national telephone survey of adults in 1990 conducted by a group of researchers using
similar criteria, estimated that 16% of men and 27% of women had been sexually abused.

When it comes to physical abuse, 28% of the men in our study had experienced this abuse as boys.
This closely parallels the 31% of men who had lived through the same type of experience and were
examined in a population-based study of Ontario men.

In conclusion, this study is a great start and uncovers some very interesting connections between
Hashimoto’s and cumulative adverse childhood experiences. The next step, of course, is to look at
how to heal from ACEs in order to lower the risk of experiencing autoimmune diseases like
Hashimoto’s, as well as potentially prevent the worsening of their symptoms.

"I am very thankful to Dr. Hedberg's commitment to

health and to his commitment to educating his patients.
He is a rare find in the field of alternative medicine."
by - Grace

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3 thoughts on “Adverse Childhood Experiences and Hashimoto’s

Disease”

 Peter Skirrow
 November 9, 2019 at 9:20 am
 Permalink

It bothers me greatly that the biggest traumatic event of all is always left out of these studies –
HOPITALISATION. I, like many others in the UK was taken to hospital on false pretences (‘we’re
going on a picnic’), left in a strange building (‘we’re just going to check on the car’) and then
stripped naked, gassed, and operated on (Tonsillectomy). I didn’t know I was in a hospital, or
what the hell was happening – I faught and tried to escape overnight. This is no isolated incident.
Fifty years later my parents told me they were told to do it by the doctors and that this was
accepted practice. When psychologist John Bowlby wrote of attachment theory, his friends the
Robinsons made a film in an NHS hospital that showed the stages of trauma to children like me –
it went on to be used in training within the NHS and should be more readily available. Dental
treatment by school dentists who gave general anaesthetic caused similar trauma! I have just
been diagnosed with Hashimotos.

 Reply

 Dr. Nikolas Hedberg Post author

 November 9, 2019 at 4:31 pm
 Permalink

Agreed that the ACE questionnaire is insufficient. For example, one question asks if your
parents were divorced but it doesn’t ask if one of your parents died. Death of a parent is more
traumatic than divorce yet it isn’t listed.

 Reply

 vasanthy
 December 15, 2019 at 2:58 pm
 Permalink

There is intervention using neurofeedbck and sensory integration- have anyone tried these.
Certainly meditaion,yoga and mindfullness practice canhelp to an extent

 Reply

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