Graves' Disease Symptoms

Graves' disease is an autoimmune condition. An autoimmune disease is a disease where the cells of the body fail to distinguish between the body's own cells and foreign cells that enter the body. Thus, they end up mistakenly attacking their own cells, leading to autoimmune disease symptoms. Graves' disease is a condition that affects the thyroid gland, often making it enlarge to more than twice its size, a condition known as goiter. Thus, the gland not only becomes hyperactive but it also leads to various hyperthyroidism symptoms.

Symptoms of Graves' Disease

Graves' disease has a female:male incidence rate of 5:1 to 10:1. Thus, its symptoms in women are more commonly seen than in men. There are certain symptoms that are characteristic of Graves' disease which help in easily diagnosing this condition:

• One symptom commonly seen in Graves' disease is exophthalmos. Exophthalmos is defined as the protrusion of the eyes out of their socket. It is also known as proptosis and is normally bilaterally seen. This occurs due to abnormal connective tissue deposition in the orbit and extraocular muscles.
• Despite an increase in the appetite of the person, the person tends to lose weight. This is because the basal metabolism rate of the person becomes very high. Thus, the person has unexplained weight loss and is always overworked and fatigued.
• The heart rate is very high. The high heart rate also leads to palpitations.
• The edema seen in Graves' disease is hallmark of this disease, as the edema is non-pitting in nature. The goiter or thyroid swelling is diffuse, without any clear demarcation.
• Graves' disease symptoms in eye are very serious and are together known as Graves' ophthalmopathy. In mild cases, the patients only present with slight eyelid retraction. Upper eyelid retraction is a sign of Graves' orbitopathy. Due to this continuous retraction, the eyes cannot blink regularly, due to which there are high chances of corneal dryness. The patients also have a dysfunctional lachrymal (tear) gland. This leads to irritation of the eye and may eventually lead to periorbital swelling and inflammation.
• In moderate cases, there may also be myopathy. The inflammation and edema may eventually lead to other abnormalities, like problems with eye muscles, leading to diplopia and other vision problems. There may be eventual fibrosis of the eye muscles. This may increase the intraocular pressure as well.
• In severe and fast progressing cases of the disease, there are critical changes in the orbit of the eye. With progressive exophthamosis, restrictive myopathy and continuous visual defects, there may eventually be complete loss of vision and permanent blindness.

Other Symptoms

• Tachycardia
• High blood pressure and arrhythmia
• Tremors on hands
• Heat intolerance
• One of the hyperactive thyroid symptoms also include restlessness and insomnia
• Polyphagia, that is increased and hunger and increase in diet
• Muscle weakness
• Irritability
• Erratic behavior and emotional instability
• Sensitivity to light
• Panic attacks

The final diagnosis will always be done with the help of blood tests to check for high thyroid levels, and not merely on the basis of symptoms. The treatment for Graves' disease will entail the use of antithyroid drugs and radioiodine. Only in very rare cases is there a need for a thyroidectomy. The most important part is that one needs to know that living with Graves' disease need not always mean living a compromised lifestyle. By regularly visiting the doctor and religiously following his instructions, one can always mitigate the symptoms to an extent where they do not interfere with day-to-day life.