Mum only knew one year later

10:00am Sunday 26th November 2006

A MOTHER who developed a pituitary disorder when she was pregnant did not realise she had the disease until over one year later.

Michelle Garner, 36, said the disease is so rare doctors are not prepared to diagnose it when the symptoms arise. It can lead to death.

She talked to the Guardian in the run-up to tomorrow's national Pituitary Awareness Day The pituitary gland is located at the base of the brain and stimulates vital hormone production in the organs, so when it fails, the "master" gland affects weight control, growth, metabolism, thirst and hunger, fertility and lactation, sexual characteristics and stress response.

Miss Garner developed the disorder when she was pregnant with her daughter Theodora, now five.

While her pituitary gland decayed, affecting the production of different hormones, it did not harm the pregnancy.

She said: "I had excruciating headaches nothing could touch because the pituitary was inflamed and because it had grown it was pushing my brain against the lining of my skull.

"One by one, it started to affect all these things. I wasn't hungry or thirsty, I was losing weight, I was not producing milk to feed my baby and any drop in temperature made me stiff.

"That carried on until I found myself unconscious. My body was so stressed without producing hormones, it eventually gave up."

Miss Garner, who lives in Mornington Road, Leytonstone, and works for Newham Council supporting the family and friends of people with mental health issues, said she suffered from extreme fatigue and one night she was so ill she fell unconscious.

She said: "I think I was dying, everything was shutting down. By the time I got to hospital my organs were failing because my blood was just clotting everywhere."

Miss Garner was given antibiotics by doctors at Whipps CrossUniversity Hospital who thought she had a virus, but when they analysed samples taken during her pregnancy, symptoms of hormonal deficiency came to light.

She became the subject of "show-and-tell" in hospital with doctors flocking in to observe the rare condition she had suffered for 18 months before the diagnosis.

She now takes hormones every hour during her working hours to keep her body working efficiently.

She said: "I was depleted of everything and it took quite a while for the hormone replacement therapy to improve my quality of life. For some people it does not work as well and they remain so fatigued they cannot go back to work.

"It is hard to mimic what the body does. and because you were never tested before no-one knows what your personal hormone levels should be, so people cannot always get back to the way they were."

Only 50,000 to 70,000 people in Britain have a pituitary disorder, either a condition like Miss Garner's or the gland can be affected by a tumour.

Miss Garner said: "The problem is that GPs are told the condition is so rare they will probably never meet someone with a pituitary condition or disorder.

"I was really keen for the doctors to realise that it can be right under your nose and they don't see it."

Miss Garner said anyone who feels they may have the symptoms should research it on www.piuitary.org.uk.