Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Subclinical hypothyroidism and euthyroid thyroiditis have in common the clinically asymptomatic character. These two diseases can occur during pregnancy with no clinical impact.

Our objectives are:

– Prevalence of subclinical hypothyroidism during the 1st trimester of pregnancy.

– Frequency of autoimmunity in euthyroid pregnant women in 1st quarter.

– Analysis of the association of thyroid autoimmunity with the parity.

Description of methods: Prospective study, made in Oran area, on 270 pregnant women in 1st quarter. Women who smoke (active smoking confessed) and those followed for thyroid disease or taking medications that interfere with the thyroid gland were excluded.

– Study protocol: clinical examination, TSH, free thyroxine (fT₄), free triiodothyronine (fT₃), thyroid antibodies (anti-peroxidase, anti-thyroglobulin and anti-TSH receptor) and cervical ultrasonography.

– Statistics tests: collection of data on EPI INFO 5.1, bivariate analysis (the χ² test, the Pearson χ² test, the Yates corrected χ² test, the Wilcoxon χ² test (log rank sum) or Mann–Whitney, the variance analysis method (ANOVA), the r correlation test, significance level P<0.05, multivariate analysis (SPSS: 10 version and MedCalc).

Results: – 23/270 pregnant women (8.5%) had subclinical hypothyroidism (TSH >2.5 mUI/l, fT₄ and fT₃ normal) with 7/23 (30.4%) wich had thyroiditis.

– 215/270 pregnant women (79.6%) were euthyroid with 24/215 (11.2%) wich had thyroiditis.

– No association was found between anti-TPO positivity and numbers of pares both in patients with subclinical hypothyroidism than those in euthyroid (P=0.72 and 0.45 respectively).

Conclusions: The prevalence of thyroid autoimmunity in the 1st trimester of pregnancy is significant. Only a determination of anti-TPO is able to unmask these euthyroid thyroiditis.

Declaration of interest: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research project.

Funding: This research did not receive any specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sector.