Swelling in throat, goitre

[ToMockAKillingBird]

A few months ago I noticed the centre right of my throat (just above the base) was swollen, I thought it may have been covid jab related so I ignored it. Since then it's got bigger, I'm assuming goitre as it's in that area. I can feel it more than see it if that makes sense and when I swallow I can feel it go up and down. I've been getting an occasional tightness in my throat too.

Other symptoms - very dry skin, hair like straw, cold all the time, constipation, tiredness etc. I have pernicious anaemia too but our GP practice has stopped doing my 3 monthly injections.

Does this sound like a thyroid problem? I have an appointment with GP next week, I don't want to be referred to hospital due to phobias. Haven't been near the doctors in nearly 2 years as it is.

Has anyone had similar? I'm 48 and perimenopausal.

Sounds exactly like when I had an undiagnosed underactive thyroid.

I hope you can speak to GP quickly and they do blood test ASAP.

Sounds very likely. Do ask gp for a blood test (underactive thyroid is usually managed by the gp rather than hospital, so don’t worry on that front). Why have they stopped your b12 injections ffs?! You must be feeling rotten!

Thank you both for your replies.
I feel rotten most of the time and have gained loads of weight which doesn't help.

@piglet81 The practice stopped doing them when Covid started and told me just to take B12 tablets. I had a few ampoules left from my prescription so self injected but once they ran out I was screwed.

Dh has one, it’s restricting his airway and his sats are 94-5 on a good day. He can’t lay flat or it shuts his airway off completely.

He needs it out now and the surgeons don’t want to do it because the chance of death is high. He was offered the chance to have it removed years ago but didn’t want to.

If they suggest removing it say yes, dh wishes he had.

I’m sorry @ToMockAKillingBird, that sounds rubbish. Maybe try harassing them about restarting the injections now that ‘living with Covid’ is supposedly the tactic. Or some people buy their own b12 online to self-inject. Not sure I’d dare, mind you!

@Fluffycloudland77
That sounds awful and incredibly stressful for you both. Is there nothing else to shrink it maybe or is surgery the only option?

@piglet81
Yes I've seen on here people buying them from chemists online in Europe. I'm petrified of getting fakes or something dodgy though. I'll ask the doc this week about it. I have permanent numbness in some of my fingers and toes due to nerve damage from PA and I don't want it getting worse tbh.

When you say you take B12 tablets do you swallow them or put them under your tongue? Under the tongue (tablets or spray) can be just as effective as injections.

And yea the rest of it sounds very much like underactive thyroid. Hope you get it sorted. Make sure they do a full thyroid panel, not just TSH to get a proper picture of what’s going on.

Unfortunately it’s too late for ablation, radiology wanted to try that at the time back in 2006 but due to dh having a biopsy with no local anaesthetic when he had hodgkins he’s very reluctant to have procedures done in that area.

The goitre might be the only thing holding his airway open though & there’s a chance he’ll need to have the op stopped and be put on life support. So it’s all a huge mess.

The anaesthesiologist who assessed him for surgery has a goitre though and said she’s not keen on having it out either and hers isn’t as big as dhs.

Dhs was fine for years & then it started to grow steadily but slowly so it’s the boiled frog analogy, you don’t realise at first and then you realise you’ve got a big growth on your neck, complicated by the fact that dh is tall but has a very skinny neck naturally so medics don’t realise his neck is much bigger than it started out as.

They offered dh an ultrasound scan, with a needle biopsy to aspirate fluid for pathology at first. If they offer you a way of getting rid of it do take it.