Does the thyroid regulate body temperature: Hypothyroidism and Your Internal Temperature
Hypothyroidism and Your Internal Temperature
How Hypothyroidism Affects Your Internal Temperature
Hypothyroidism symptoms include constipation, fatigue, joint or muscle pain, and even depression. The condition can also cause an increased sensitivity to cold temperatures.
“With hypothyroidism, metabolism slows, body temperature drops, cutaneous (skin) vasoconstriction occurs, and the patient may feel cold even in a warm environment,” says Harris L. Wasser, MD, an endocrinologist at Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks, Calif.
That said, feeling cold in the hands and feet isn’t enough to make a hypothyroidism diagnosis. These sensations may also be symptoms of a wide range of other conditions, including anemia and impaired circulation.
Hypothyroidism and External Temperature
While internal processes affect the body’s use of thyroid hormones, severe outside temperatures can affect those with hypothyroidism as well.
A study published in the European Journal of Endocrinology in 2012 looked at the impact of the chronic cold in Greenland on thyroid activity among its residents, both indigenous Inuits and non-Inuits. Results showed increased thyroid hormone consumption across the board.
Dr. Wasser cautions, however, that this may be an unusual situation. “In extreme, chronic, or severe cold exposure — in regions such as Arctic or northern Alaska — cold adaptation is reported to increase thyroid production and turnover,” he says. But, he notes, “exposure to cold external temperatures in general produces minimum to no change in thyroid levels.”
Confirming a Hypothyroidism Diagnosis
While feeling cold isn’t enough to diagnose hypothyroidism alone, it may be a sign that it’s time to test for it. Talk to your doctor and ask about having your thyroid function checked. Your doctor should examine your thyroid gland and look for other physical clues, such as brittle nails and hair, swelling of the arms or legs, and coarse facial features.
A simple blood test can measure levels of the thyroid hormone TSH — higher than normal TSH levels are most often due to hypothyroidism.
If a positive diagnosis is made, the next step is to undergo thyroid hormone treatment, which can help to reverse a low body temperature and any other hypothyroidism symptoms, says Frederick Singer, MD, an endocrinologist and director of the endocrinology and bone disease program at the John Wayne Cancer Institute at Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, Calif. Then, by following your prescribed treatment plan, you can help ensure that thyroid levels return to normal.
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How Thyroid Maintains Body Temperature?
How Thyroid Maintains Body Temperature?
Created On
Dec 07 2020
Last Updated
Feb 21 2023
This summary includes research published in peer-reviewed journals including Frontiers in Bioscience, Archives of Internal Medicine, Physiological Reviews, and more.
We humans differ from animals and birds in a unique way: we can maintain a constant body temperature and don’t require hibernation or migration to warmer climates.
As simple as this may sound, maintaining body temperature has taken millions of years to evolve.
Beyond a certain amount of heat generated from metabolism, this requires a system that can generate additional heat in order to raise body temperature (e.
g., to 37° C for humans, 42° C for birds).
Fighting Cold
During cold, as outside temperature drops, blood vessels shrink to reduce heat loss and people curl up like a sphere, to minimize the exposed area of the body (sphere has minimum surface area for a given size).
In parallel, the body starts generating heat. At first through shivering, but then the baseline metabolic rate increases. Over time, the brown fat deposited around vital organs such as kidney, spinal cord and blood vessels starts to generate enough heat to raise the body temperature.
What if the outside temperature is too high?
We have developed unique processes to dissipate heat and lower the body temperature. Sweating to cool down, and slowing down of certain biological processes to reduce heat generated in the body are just few examples. (That’s one reason why people eat spicy food in hot climates, because it increases sweating, which cools the body.)
Metabolic Rate
The baseline metabolic rate, or BMR, is the lowest amount of energy necessary to stay alive.
This would ideally be the minimum energy our body needs.
It is measured at rest, after a meal, and at ambient temperature when no work is needed to heat or cool the body in response to outside temperature fluctuations.
Since we often live indoor at 20-25° C, our body is constantly burning stored fat to keep the temperature at 37° C.
In animals that live in cold environments, more body heat is necessary to maintain the temperature. It comes from a higher baseline metabolic rate and constant heat generated from the stored fat.
The baseline metabolic rate—sometimes also called, resting energy expenditure—depends on size, genetics, and many other factors including age, pregnancy, and gender.
Role of Thyroid Hormones
Thyroid is one of the main knobs to maintain a tightly controlled temperature around a 37° C (or 98.6° F). Even birds and other mammals use thyroid hormones to balance their body temperature.
During cold, thyroid hormones, T4 and T3 will stimulate the body to generate more heat.
In hot weather, when outside temperature rises above our body temperature, the release of TSH slows down. T4 and T3 already circulating in the blood lose an iodine atom and convert into non-active forms, e.g., T4 into reverse T3 (rT3).
What happens if the system malfunctions and the body continues to produce thyroid hormones?
Hyperthyroidism is such a condition when excess thyroid hormone, T4, circulates in the blood. As a consequence, the body constantly struggles to lower the temperature. This results in common symptoms of fatigue, high sensitivity of heat, irritation, and weight loss.
On the other hand, in hypothyroidism, our body can not supply enough thyroid hormones to maintain the temperature. A typical symptom is continuous feeling of cold.
Initially, TSH levels rise (or drop) to maintain sufficient T4 and T3 levels. However, beyond a certain level when TSH levels saturate (or bottom out), the system malfunctions, resulting in a thyroid disorder.
Thyroid and Body Fat
The so called brown adipose tissue—the brown fat distributed around key organs such as liver, heart, kidneys, etc.
—is one of the key players in maintaining body temperature. On exposure to cold, these BAT cells generate the necessary heat to raise the temperature.
In hypermetabolic state—in hyperthyroidism—resting energy spending increases, people lose weight, their cholesterol levels drop, brown and white fat burning increases, and a higher blood sugar appears. These processes reverse in case of hypothyroidism.
Technical info – how a signal of feeling cold, translates into heat generation in the body?
As soon as the skin senses cold, blood vessels shrink, and the sympathetic nerves send signal to hypothalamus. This causes shivering, and the brown fat surrounding blood vessels and key organs receive signal to activate their adrenaline receptors (norepinephrine). This results in fat burning (lipolysis) to release heat in the body. Thyroid hormones and the uncoupling protein (UCP1) rapidly activate by lipolysis and the cell mitochondria oxidation results in heat generation.
Thyroid and Diabetes
Have you noticed the feeling of slump after a meal?
That’s because carbohydrate metabolism and the resulting insulin acts as a switch to activate the enzyme responsible for body heat generation.
Fasting slows down the supply of thyroid hormones to avoid any fat burning in the body—a behavior similar to hypothyroidism.
In diabetes, the insulin resistance affects body’s ability to stay warm through heat generation from the process of burning brown fat tissues.
In animals that have thyroid dysfunction—and can not properly control the process of fat burning to generate heat—continuous eating is essential to keep them warm.
During extreme starvation, the body shuts down this heat producing mechanism. Similar slow down occurs in hibernation, which is also mediated by thyroid hormones.
Thyroid and Weight Loss
Thyroid hormones play a key role in controlling metabolism together with brain, white fat, brown fat, skeleton muscles, liver, and pancreas.
That’s why they are considered potential paths to solve the metabolic disorders related to obesity, diabetes, and high cholesterol. A thyroid test is one of the first step to understand the underlying issues.
Low thyroid hormone levels are also associated with retaining water in the body. On treatment, release of this excess water results in weight loss (amount of fat generally remains the same).
Studies suggest hyperthyroidism increases craving for carbohydrates which returns to normal after treatment of high thyroid hormones levels.
Interestingly, T3 is about ten-times more active than T4 in the body. That’s why it is seems to be more effective in weight loss and lowering cholesterol. However, no effect on insulin or cardiovascular health occurs.
A tiny gland in the throat has developed as a vital organ to maintain such a complex system of temperature control is truly an amazing feat of evolution.
References:
Thyroid Hormone Regulation of Metabolism by Mullur et.
al., Physiological Reviews, Vol 92, Apr 2014.Physiological importance and control of non-shivering facultative thermogenesis by J. Enrique Silva, Frontiers in Bioscience, S3, Jan 2011.
Relations of Thyroid Function to Body Weight: Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Observations in a Community-Based Sample by Fox et. al., Archives of Internal Medicine, Vol 168, Mar 2008.
Mechanisms of thyroid hormone action by Gregory A Brent, The Journal of Clinical Investigation, Vol 122, Sep 2012.
al., Physiological Reviews, Vol 92, Apr 2014.An unhealthy thyroid gland disrupts thermoregulation – Gazeta.Ru
If you are cold – check your thyroid gland – Gazeta.Ru
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Scientists have found out why people with thyroid disorders are more sensitive to ambient temperature.
Those who have an overactive or underactive thyroid gland often feel that their body temperature is above or below normal. This phenomenon is well known to physicians, but until now it has been associated exclusively with the influence of thyroid hormones on the intensity of metabolism in cells.
Swedish scientists have found that the main cause of thermoregulation disorders lies not at all in a change in metabolism, but in the effect of thyroid hormones on blood vessels.
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Hormones are signal molecules that are produced in the body in small quantities and are carried with the bloodstream to all organs and cells. When they interact with receptors, the signal is greatly amplified and converted into a physiological one. There can be different receptors for the same hormone in different organs. For example, the thyroid hormone receptor TR-α1 is most active in cardiac and skeletal muscle.
Scientists from the Karolinska Institute in Sweden have obtained a mutant line of laboratory mice in which TR-α1 was “broken”. The mutant rodents generated large amounts of heat as metabolism increased dramatically in a specialized tissue called brown fat. Brown adipose tissue is present in all mammals. It is especially developed in hibernating animals. People also have it: in newborns it is 5% of the total body weight.
The main function of brown fat is to give warmth “from the inside”, to warm.
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So, as Swedish scientists found out, despite the increased metabolic activity of brown adipose tissue, the body temperature of mutant rodents with a broken thyroid hormone receptor did not increase. It turned out that, among other things, when the receptor was broken, blood vessels lost their ability to narrow or expand under the influence of signaling molecules of the nervous system, such as acetylcholine.
When scientists measured the temperature of various parts of the body of mutant mice using infrared thermography, they noticed that the heat generated by brown fat dissipated through the surface of the body, and was not stored, as is the case with normal functioning of the body, and was not used for internal heating. Especially a lot of heat “leaked” through the tail. By injecting a specially selected vasoconstrictor into the tail artery, it was possible to prevent heat loss and, as a result, normalize the activity of brown adipose tissue.
The findings, according to scientists, explain why patients with thyroid diseases are so sensitive to temperature changes.
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This is the first study of its kind to discover the molecular mechanisms of thyroid hormone-mediated thermoregulation and show the relationship between processes occurring in adipose tissue and the cardiovascular system.
It also became clear that the unbalanced work of blood vessels nullifies all the body’s efforts aimed at heating. Mice that produce excess heat and are unable to store it get cold. People are in a better position. Unlike rodents, they can wrap themselves in a warm sweater or turn on the air conditioner for heating. Nevertheless, in the long term, these studies should be considered as the first stage in the search for means of correcting vascular dysfunction. Results of work published in the scientific journal PNAS .
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Body temperature depends on the level of thyroid hormones
July 2, 2013 about 09
Kotikovich Yu.
S.
Keywords:
hypothyroidism,
adipose tissue,
blood vessels,
thyroid hormones,
thyroid gland
Specialties:
Endocrinology
Internal Medicine
90 004 Summary
Results of a study by Swedish scientists on laboratory animals
In a new study, Swedish scientists from the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, have determined how thyroid hormones (thyroid gland) affect blood vessels and thereby determine body temperature. They believe the findings will help explain why thyroid patients are more sensitive to ambient temperature than healthy people. The results of the study were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Thyroid hormones are the main regulators of thermogenesis, affecting both peripheral organs and central autonomous mechanisms. It is known that with hyperfunction of the thyroid gland, a person experiences heat intolerance and a feeling of constant heat, his skin has an elevated temperature, and with hypofunction, on the contrary, low temperature intolerance and a decrease in body temperature are characteristic.
In previous studies, scientists have found out how thyroid hormones affect metabolism at the cellular level.
In this work, the state of thermogenesis in laboratory mice with receptor-mediated hypothyroidism resulting from a mutation of one of the thyroid hormone receptors, TR-alpha 1, was studied. The researchers note that this receptor is expressed only in some tissues, and with the studied mutation, these tissues (central nervous system, bone and muscle tissue) become immune to the action of thyroid hormones. The author of the study, Dr. Amy Warner, noted that this mutation greatly facilitates the process of studying certain aspects of thyroid dysfunction, while the state of most organs and systems remains normal. She recalled that thyroid hormones determine the level of basal metabolism, affecting the rate of cellular metabolism, therefore, with hypothyroidism, all processes should slow down.
However, in previous studies, scientists noted that mice with a similar mutation had an accelerated metabolism due to the production of energy necessary for the synthesis of heat from their brown adipose tissue.
In this paper, after analyzing the infrared radiation of mice, the researchers were surprised to find that mice lose a significant amount of energy through their tails – a mutation in the receptor led to the fact that the organisms of these animals were unable to adequately regulate the narrowing of blood vessels.
With the help of the tail, healthy mice regulate body temperature by changing the lumen of blood vessels. When this regulation is not possible in mice, heat synthesis from brown adipose tissue is activated, which, in turn, increases the need for energy and accelerates metabolism, despite hypothyroidism. When midodrine, a drug that causes blood vessels to constrict, was administered to mice, heat loss through the tail was reduced, and mice were able to maintain body temperature without activating heat production from brown adipose tissue. Their oxygen and nutrient requirements also returned to normal, which supports the assumption that the increased energy expenditure is caused by the mobilization of adipose tissue, and not by mutation of the receptors.