For those of you who take thyroid hormone supplement, do you notice your insulin needs/carb ratio changing depending on whether you start going hyperthyroid (meds too high) vs. normal range vs. hypothyroid (meds too low)?
I take levothyroxine (T4) as well as liothyronine (T3) to treat my hypothyroid. I’ve not noticed a cause and effect direct connection to my insulin needs. I make changes to my basal rate and insulin sensitivity factor schedules almost every week.
So, noticing a connection between thyroid med doses and changing insulin needs amidst an environment that is always dynamic is difficult to detect.
I expect this dynamic need for insulin dosing is a part of diabetes. It may have some connection to thyroid treatment but I haven’t noticed it. One symptom that I have noticed, in my case, is an increase in my heart rate as I move toward too high of a thyroid dose.
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I have trouble staying out of the hypothyroid range and I am never hyperthyroid. I have not thought about how my insulin needs might be affected by my thyroid levels.
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This is a very timely conversation for me. Recent dx of Hashimotos and taking levothyroxine to tirosint and tomorrow will start synthroid and liothyronine.
Yes. I have had some weird blood sugar ups and downs that I’ve attributed to thyroid medication. It makes sense to me because I was hypothyroid so needed more insulin. The medication is revving up my metabolism so I seem to need less insulin.
True! Thanks for your input.
I’ve read that the opposite can also happen - that hyperthyroidism can cause insulin resistance, raising insulin requirements. I think the takeaway may be, that if your thyroid meds are off by a fair amount in either direction, it can affect glucose in either direction as well, but probably doesn’t cause significant effects w/ a thyroid at high end or low end in range, or even slightly out of range…