In the United States, more than ten million men and women are being monitored for thyroxine therapy. About 15% of women over 65 years old are at risk for sub-clinical hypothyroidism and 4.5 million pregnant women and about two million postpartum women are at increased risk of some form of thyroid dysfunction. The usual method of diagnosing and monitoring these persons is with serum thyroid stimulating hormone levels and serum levels of thyroxine. Cost-effective analyses confirm that diagnostic effectiveness proportionally as the cost of testing decreases. The objective of this project is to try to measure levels of the various thyroid hormones in urine to seek simpler, less expensive and more efficient screening and monitoring procedures.
A method of measuring thyroid stimulating hormone and thyroid hormones in urine could be a useful addition to current methods of evaluating thyroid function.
