Relationship of H pylori gut infections and Thyroid Antibodies

[Guest guest]

Hi All,

Just wanted to give an update. Saw an endocrinologist yesterday and within 5 minutes she diagnosed me with Hashimoto's Thyroiditis. Diagnosis was based on blood work I had 2 years ago indicating elevated thyroid antibodies (something Patty has always suggested be tested...thank you Patty!) as well as symptoms. The doctor said that elevated thyroid antibodies are a clean indicator of Hashi's even if TSH is normal. Unfortunately it's hard to find a doc who knows enough to test for antibodies and then understand what elevated antibodies mean...saw countless docs who acted as if my thyroid is all good and fine despite debilitating symptoms.

Anyway, because I also have leaky gut from h pylori, I was curious how that impacts the thyroid and came across numerous articles discussing a relationship. So if any of you are experiencing gut issues (or not...because depending on where the infection is in the gut can affect level of symptoms), I would have your thyroid antibodies tested as Patty has always suggested from the getgo. Some people don't feel gut symptoms yet have brain fog and I have read that it's because the inflammation in the gut is in an area of the intestines where there are less nerves and they might have infection but just not feel it versus if it's present in the stomach we can feel more aches, pains and bloating.

Here's the medical article/abstract on the connection of h pylori and Hashi's/Thyroid Antibodies.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18271683

Physiol Res. 2008;57 Suppl 1:S135-41. Epub 2008 Feb 13.

Anti-Helicobacter Pylori, anti-thyroid peroxidase, anti-thyroglobulin and anti-gastric parietal cells antibodies in Czech population.

Sterzl I, Hrdá P, Matucha P, Cerovská J, Zamrazil V.

Institute of Endocrinology, Prague, Czech Republic. ister@...

Abstract

Autoimmune thyropathies are frequently linked to many infections, such as Helicobacter pylori, which are also supposed to play a role in their pathogenesis. The aim of this study was to evaluate the relationships between thyroid and gastric autoimmunity and H. pylori infection on a large sample of Czech population (n=1621) by monitoring the autoantibodies against thyroglobulin (anti-Tg) and thyroid peroxidase (anti-TPO) and gastric parietal cell (anti-GPC, representing thyrogastric syndrome) in correlation with antibodies against Helicobacter pylori (anti-H. pylori) of classes IgG and IgA. The interrelation between autoantibodies and H. pylori antibodies was assessed by H. pylori seropositivity. In H. pylori seropositive persons as compared to seronegative irrespective of age and sex, a higher occurrence of anti-TPO (10.4 % vs. 5.8 %, p=0.001) and anti-GPC (6.1 % vs. 1.7 %, p<0.001) was found. Differences in anti-TPO occurrence were significant in both men (7.0 % vs. 3.3 %, p=0.03) and women (12.7 % vs. 8.0 %, p=0.02), differences in anti-GPC occurrence were significant only in women (7.2 % vs. 1.7 %, p<0.001). Results of this study support the idea of a connection between infection of H. pylori and the occurrence of anti-TPO autoantibodies representing thyroid autoimmunity and gastric parietal cells autoantibodies representing the thyrogastric syndrome.

Physiol Res. 2008;57 Suppl 1:S135-41. Epub 2008 Feb 13.