THIS IS HOW I FEEL THE BEST.  Obviously I am not a doctor but after seeing hundreds of thyroid specialist, this is how I feel the best. I have put my optimal ranges for myself.

Complete Set of Thyroid Lab tests Include

❏ TSH (Thyroid stimulating hormone)

❏ Free T3 (Triiodothyronine, free)

❏ Free T4 (Thyroxine, free)

❏ Reverse T3 (Triiodothyronine, reverse)

❏ Total T3 (Total triiodothyronine)

❏ Total T4

❏ T3 UPTAKE

❏ Thyroglobulin Antibody

❏ Thyroid Peroxidase Antibody

TSH

Thyroid-stimulating hormone is released from your pituitary gland to communicate with your thyroid. If your TSH is high, it’s sort of like your brain shouting at your thyroid to work harder.

Lab range: .45-5.5 mlU/L

Optimal range: .5 -1.5  mlU/L

Total T4

T4 is mostly metabolically inactive in the body and has to be converted to T3 to be usable. This lab gives you a total of unbound and bound forms of T4. Hormones have to be unbound from the protein carrier to be used by your body. Because of this, this lab doesn’t give us the activity of T4 when measured alone. T4 is measured in conjunction with a T3 uptake.

Lab range: 4.5-12 mcg/DL

Optimal range: 6.0-12.0 mcg/DL

T3 Uptake

This lab doesn’t look directly at T3, but is very useful at indirectly looking at other hormones such as estrogen or testosterone and their relation with the binding of thyroid hormones.

Reference range: 22-35%

Optimal range: 28-38%

Total T3

This lab shows us the total amount of the metabolically active thyroid hormone. It allows a doctor to check your body’s ability to convert T4 to T3 and to rule out an overactive thyroid.

Lab range: 80-200 ng/DL

Optimal range: 150-180 ng/DL

Free T4

This will tell you the levels of free or active form of T4. This will be low in cases of hypothyroidism but can be normal in subclinical, early stages of thyroid dysfunction.

Lab range: 0.8-1.8 ng/DL

Optimal range: 1.4-1.7 ng/DL

Free T3

This is the more active, usable form of your thyroid hormone. Low T3 syndromes are a common dysfunction that I see. The problem, if you’re taking a synthetic T4 medication, is that your body isn’t converting the hormone properly into T3

Lab range: 2.3-4.2 pg/mL

Optimal range: 3.8-4.4 pg/mL

Reverse T3

Chronic stress and high cortisol can raise  of reverse T3, which is an unusable form of the thyroid hormone.

Reference range: 8-25 ng/DL

Optimal range: 9.2-15 ng/DL

Thyroid Antibodies

High levels of thyroid antibodies show an autoimmune attack against the thyroid. The overwhelming majority of low thyroid cases are on the autoimmune spectrum, the most common being hashimotos

Thyroid Peroxidase (TPO) Ab optimal range: 0-5 IU/mL

Thyroglobulin Ab optimal range: 0-0.3 IU/mL

I recommend the complete Thyroid profile