A Study on Serum Ferritin and Hypothyroidism among Patients Attending A Tertiary Care Hospital With Special Emphasis On Effect Of Thyroid Hormone Replacement Therapy

Abstract

Introduction: Thyroid gland is a bi-lobed endocrine gland and it secretes thyroxin (T4) and tri-iodothyronine (T3) hormones and it is under the regulation of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH). Iron is one of the important elements required for normal functioning of thyroid gland and it is stored in the body in the form of ferritin and it is an intracellular protein. Present study is an attempt to find out correlation, if any between serum ferritin and hypothyroidism and also changes of serum ferritin level after correction of the disorders with levothyroxine therapy. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted by Department of Biochemistry, Darbhanga Medical College, Laheriasri, Bihar. Study was conducted from December 2021 to May 2022. Written informed consent was obtained from each participant before inclusion in the study. Prior ethical approval was obtained from the Institutional Ethics Committee. The study population comprised of 100 hypothyroid and 100 euthyroid subjects of age >18 years. Blood sample was collected from the study participants who visited the laboratory for their thyroid hormone. From the selected subjects, under aseptic precautions, 3ml of venous blood sample was drawn into a non-vacuum plain tube with clot activator. These tubes were allowed to stand for specific period of about 15-20 minutes. Then tubes were centrifuged for 3500rpm for 15- 20 min. The collected data was entered in Microsoft excel and the data analyzed by using Statistical Package for Social Sciences ver. 20.0 (IBM, Chicago). Results: The mean values of TSH were higher among hypothyroid subjects as compared to euthyroid subjects. Whereas T4, T3 and ferritin were found be lower among hypothyroid subjects as compared to euthyroid subjects. TSH, T4, T3 and ferritin showed statistically significant difference between euthyroid and hypothyroid subjects with a p value of <0.05. There was a negative correlation between TSH and serum ferritin among study subjects (r= 0.07) implying that as serum TSH levels were increasing serum ferritin levels kept on decreasing. Conclusion: In our study we found that there is a significant difference in serum ferritin levels between hypothyroid and euthyroid subjects. Hence measurement of serum ferritin before and after thyroid hormone therapy may provide useful information with regard to diagnosis and prognosis of thyroid disease.