[The clinical and echographic assessment of thyroid function and structure in patients with a chronic inflammatory...

In Crohn's disease (CD) and in ulcerative colitis (UC) data about possible thyroid involvement are lacking. We studied thyroid morphology and function in 41 patients affected by active inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) (14 UC; 27 CD) before (all) and 45 and 90 days after onset of therapy (23/41), and in 60 normal control subjects. At each time, the following tests were performed: thyroid sonography, hormonal and immunological assays. A statistically significant increase of thyroid volume was found in IBD compared to control subjects, more frequently in CD (70.4%) than in UC (14.3%). Parenchymal structure was inhomogeneous (88.4% CD; 15.4% UC) with increased frequency compared to control subjects (12.7%). Hormone assays demonstrated increased FT4 values in UC (64.3%) and decreased T4 values in CD (51.8%). Patients affected with IBD showed an increased frequency of anti-thyroglobulin and anti-thyroid peroxidase antibodies. Such abnormalities subsided only partially after therapy. Our data suggest that in IBD there is a frequent thyroid involvement with morphological, hormonal, and immunological abnormalities.