Painless thyroiditis occurring during long-term treatment with interferon alfa in a patient with chronic active hepatitis C.
We describe here painless thyroiditis during interferon (IFN) therapy in a 65-year-old man with chronic active hepatitis C. The patient had hypothyroidism in the late stage of a 24-week course of treatment with IFN-alpha. After cessation of the treatment a small, firm goiter was noticed, and chronic focal thyroiditis was diagnosed histologically. Analyses of the stock serum samples drawn before, during, and after IFN-alpha therapy revealed transient hyperthyroidism followed by transient hypothyroid states with aggravation of antithyroid hormone antibody titers. These findings suggest that long-term IFN-alpha therapy caused painless thyroiditis with aggravation of autoimmunity in our patient with preexisting chronic thyroiditis.
Department of Internal Medicine, Kanazawa Medical University, Uchinada, Japan.
K
K
Uchida
A
A
Matsui
S
S
Nakano
T
T
Kigoshi
S
S
Morimoto
D000368:Aged; D015551:Autoimmunity; D002908:Chronic Disease; D006526:Hepatitis C / Q000628:therapy*; D006521:Hepatitis, Chronic / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans; D016898:Interferon-alpha / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000009:adverse effects*; D008297:Male; D013966:Thyroiditis / Q000209:etiology* / Q000276:immunology / Q000473:pathology
D016898:Interferon-alpha