Thyroid eye disease Matenga repe tenga ki te karu
Thyroid eye disease is a condition where the muscles and soft tissues around and behind your eyes become swollen. It mainly affects people with an overactive thyroid gland.
Causes of thyroid eye disease
Thyroid eye disease is usually caused by an over-active thyroid gland that makes too much thyroid hormone. This is is most often caused by an autoimmune condition called Graves' disease.
Overactive thyroid (hyperthyroidism)
Occasionally, thyroid eye disease can happen in people who do not have an overactive thyroid.
Symptoms of thyroid eye disease
All symptoms happen because of swollen tissue around your eye and within your eye socket.
Most people have a mild form of the disease, which causes irritation, redness or dryness at the front of their eyes.
A few people get worse problems, including bulging and 'staring' eyes and double vision (if their eye muscles are affected).
In advanced cases, which are extremely rare, vision may be affected with:
- colours appearing more washed out
- blurred vision, loss of detailed vision and loss of vision.
Diagnosing thyroid eye disease
Your healthcare provider will ask you about your symptoms and examine your eyes.
If they think you may have thyroid eye disease, they will arrange for you to have a blood test to check your thyroid hormones. You may be referred to a specialist eye doctor (ophthalmologist).
Treating thyroid eye disease
You will need to have treatment for your overactive thyroid to get your hormones back to normal levels.
If you smoke, stop immediately. Smoking makes thyroid eye disease worse.
Other treatments and self care will depend on how bad your eye disease is and can include:
- lubricating eye drops or ointments to help with dry eyes
- placing a cool damp cloth over your eyes
- wearing sunglasses
- sleeping with the head of your bed raised to ease pressure on your eyes
- special glasses with prism lenses to help with double vision
- steroids (either oral steroids or injections into the skin around your eye) if you have double vision or your optic nerve is compressed
- medicines to suppress your immune system (immunosuppressants).
Rarely, some people need surgery to:
- remove some of the swollen tissue from behind their eyes
- improve the position of their eyelids
- reposition their eye muscles to reduce double vision.
Thyroid eye disease eventually settles down, but it can take 2 to 3 years to completely get better.
You can find more detailed information about thyroid eye disease on the British Thyroid Foundation website.