should I worry about this cortisol value? - Addison's Disease Message Board

wobbly · 05-24-2003, 06:27 PM

Hi all,
I'm still battling some very weird symptoms--I have thyroid problems and am having a major flare right now. Most of my symptoms are classic thyroid stuff, except that I have basically no appetite (the smell of food really turns me off), and a lot of nausea and sometimes vomiting in the morning. Whenever I've had my BP checked it's been right on normal (120/80). I finally got a serum cortisol and it was 16.20 (normal = 5.00-23.00). However, the normal range is really wide and I wonder if I should still be concerned that I have some type of adrenal issues going on. What do you guys think?
Thanks for any advice you can give me!

Eagle · 05-29-2003, 06:58 PM

Don't know, but maybe some mineral deficiency? I'm not a medical professional, just an ordinary person making a stab in the dark.

Doby · 06-01-2003, 05:49 PM

My ND would call that functionally high. I had mine done and it was 15.5 then we did an adrenal stress index that showed my cortisol level at four different times of the day and that was really way off. Way too high in the AM and bottoming out at 4:00 pm. I couldn't get my primary care doctor to run the tests I wanted though and had to go the naturopathic route. I'm so glad I did because I have been feeling so bad for seven years and been diagnosed with anxiety/MS/Vertigo/you name it and STILL feeling terrible but she finally has a name for what I feel and we're just now trying to find a program that will work and having a hard time of it. But at least I know what I have now and I feel better just knowing that.