[Proceedings: Pituitary thyroid axis in subacute thyroiditis (author's transl)]

We studied 10 patients with subacute thyroiditis. All had an increase in free thyroxine index, PBI, T4 and PBI/T4 ratio, an absence of thyroidal radioiodine uptake and no increase in plasma TSH after TRH injection. Exogenous TSH increased the uptake in 6/9 patients. The three patients who did not respond to TSH had higher PBI/T4 ratio than others. After treatment for one month there was either a normalization of laboratory tests either a subnormal thyroid function associated with an absence of response to TRH. All tests became normal two months later.