Clinical Profiles of Males with Graves’Disease: A Two Year Review in a Tertiary Hospital in Nigeria

Abstract

Background and Objectives: Graves’ disease is the commonest cause of thyrotoxicosis and it is much less common in males. Also, there is scanty information about the clinical characteristics of males with Graves’ disease. The objectives of the study were to determine the frequency of males with Graves’ disease seen by the Endocrinology unit of a tertiary hospital and describe their clinical characteristics. Subjects, Materials and Methods: Clinical data was retrieved from the case records of patients with thyroid disease seen between January, 2016 and January, 2018 and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results: 61 patients with Graves’ disease were seen out of which 6 cases were males giving a frequency of 10.9%. The male-to-female ratio was 1:9. The mean age at diagnosis of the male cases was 45 ± 16 years. All the patients had goitre and weight loss. 50% had heat intolerance, excessive sweating, palpitation, hyperdefaecation and hand tremors. Thyroid eye disease and thyrotoxic heart disease were found in 50% of the cases respectively. There was no statistically significant difference in the initial free thyroxine between males and females (p=0.18). There was no statistically significant association between initial free thyroxine and thyroid eye disease (p=0.39). Conclusion: Graves’ disease is 9 times commoner in females compared to males in our centre. The clinical features in males are similar to reported features in females except thyroid eye disease which appears commoner in males