Epidemiology
Recent studies put the incidence of Graves' disease at one to two cases per 1,000 population per year in England. It occurs much more frequently in women than in men. The disease frequently presents itself during early adolescence or begins gradually in adult women, often after childbirth, and is progressive until treatment. It has a powerful hereditary component.
Graves' disease tends to be more severe in men, even though it is rarer. It appears less likely to go into permanent remission and the eye disease tends to be more severe, but men are less likely to have large goitres. In a statistical study of symptoms and signs of 184 thyrotoxic patients (52 men, 132 women), the male patients were somewhat older than the females, and cases were more severe among men than among women. Cardiac symptoms were more common in women, even though the men were older and more often had a severe form of the disease; palpitations and dyspnea were more common and severe in women.
Cigarette smoking, which is associated with many autoimmune diseases, raises the incidence of Graves' ophthalmopathy 7.7-fold.
Read more about this topic: Graves' Disease