Heterophile antibody interference with thyroid assay

Kek Peng Chin1, Yeo Chin Pin

  • 1Department of Endocrinology, Singapore General Hospital, Singapore. kek.peng.chin@sgh.com.sg

Immunoassays are one of the main methods of measuring thyroid hormones. They are prone to interference. Interference of the immunoassays has been increasingly recognized as a problem because it may lead to misinterpretation of results resulting in unnecessary investigation and wrong course of treatment. We describe a patient who had interference in her thyroid function measurements (free T4, free T3 and TSH) during the course of treatment for Graves' disease.

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