Thank you for visiting ADNetwork which provides support and information for patients with Addison's Disease.

I am Mike Welch, a retired Chief Biomedical Scientist with over 36 years laboratory experience who specialised in haematology at one of UK's largest hospitals. I was diagnosed with primary Addison's disease, as part of polyglandular syndrome, in 1996 and was told by three doctors to take early retirement on health grounds in 1998.

My wife is Margaret, who also has multiple autoimmune disorders including Addisons, Hashimoto's, Myasthenia gravis, Diabetes mellitus. It took years and many endocrinologists and other physicians before it was established that Margaret does also suffer from Addison's disease. The comment made by the clinician who finally made the diagnosis was 'What part of Addison's could they not see?', referring to previous investigating clinicians!

There may in our case be an explanation why we have similar autoimmune problems. It was not until around 1984 that I discovered that my great great grandfather, William Spencer, was the brother of Margaret's great great grandfather, James Arthur Spencer. That makes us fourth cousins!

We both have Hashimoto's autoimmune thyroiditis, as do three of our four daughters, one of whom also already has an additional specific autoimmune antibody making it likely that she will develop pernicious anaemia in later life.

We would welcome any original contributory articles on Addison's disease, for consideration for future publication on this web site. Please use the address in the 'Contact us' at the bottom of this page to e-mail any articles to us. Please type, or 'copy and paste' your article into the body of the e-mail, with the single word 'Article' in the subject line. Please do not use or add attachments as these will not be opened.

Please indicate clearly at the top of your article that we may use all or part of it at our discretion, or we will be unable to do so.