Comments on: Another interesting reply to a patient by the FDA

By: Liz

Liz — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 02:45:24 +0000

Why doesnt the FDA go after the cigarette companies that are killing millions with their poison If they are so damn concerned about people. Leave our natural thyroid meds alone.
What I find funny is that they can prescribe marijuana in Cali, to anyone who can get a prescription, but thyroid patients cant get something thats been around 100+ years and makes them feel good too?
Oh and I’m curious? How do you regulate pot? How can you be sure of it’s consistency too? How by smoking it?

Enough of this B.S.

Put a damn warning label on my pill bottle if you must and give me my damn meds already.

By: Millie

Millie — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 03:12:28 +0000

I just went to pick up my mom’s armour thyroid at Target this evening where I have had no trouble getting it in the past. I was told it is on backorder indefinitely, they were only able to give me 40 out of 60 pills ordered for 30 days, and they couldn’t tell me when they would get it in.

By: Kim

Kim — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 15:35:31 +0000

When I called Walgreens (in San Francisco, 3 stores) last week, they had *just* received 2 grain tablets of Armour, but had no Naturethroid. I got the last 135 1 grain tablets.

By: Colleen Coble

Colleen Coble — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 12:52:55 +0000

I have no trouble getting Armour from Walgreens but they can’t get me Naturethroid for 90 days. I’m going to try the compounding pharmacy that makes my bioidentical hormones today and see what they tell me. They’ll know more about what’s going on. Armour wasn’t working as well so I asked my doctor to switch me to Naturethroid and discovered their shortage. They told Walgreens they’d had a huge upswing in orders and couldn’t keep up with demand. I think that’s likely because of websites like this where we talk about the problems and what we’ve tried that works better. They told Walgreens they have very high demands for quality and it will take that long to get enough supply that matches their high standards.

By: Rob Marks

Rob Marks — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:37:09 +0000

Wow, am I confused!

What I’ve read initially was that the FDA has halted domestic production of all Armour thyroid or desiccated thyroid because it wants producers to go through the process of running tests and producing data to show the efficacy and safety of these products despite the fact that they have been in use for more than 40 years and were believed grandfathered.

Separately, the FDA or the EPA has halted production of the sole source of raw material at Americn Laboratories, Inc. in Omaha, Nebraska.

Now, I’m reading messages on this bulletin board that quote the FDA as saying that they are not halting production and the suggestion by those posting that Forest Labs is playing games with the issue.

What’s the facts?

(From Janie: right now there’s so much speculation that it’s muddying things up. Sorry about your confusion. This is why I am calling for all of us to stick to facts, and be careful with speculation. Your second paragraph…I have not heard. It’s a mess, isn’t it!)

By: Linda

Linda — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:36:39 +0000

@Judy: I didn’t know that U.S. pharmacies could order product from Canada. Since the FDA shut down generics here, would they allow Erfa to be sold? If so, I wonder why more pharmacies don’t just order Erfa. I’m going to ask my pharmacy about that.

Re Armour in certain sizes: my Walgreen’s spent 2 weeks trying to scrounge up either Nature-throid or Armour for me and finally came up with a month’s worth of the 120 mg size of Armour. I was surprised they were able to do that, since everyone else in town was telling me they were totally out of everything.

By: Judy J.

Judy J. — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 04:55:11 +0000

I went to Walgreens at 1st and Patterson yesterday and they said they could get desiccated thyroid from their suppliers. The exception is Armour and it appears Forest Labs are playing games with supply and demand for pharmacies. They don’t care too much since they have enough desiccated thyroid from Major and other sources. I got the feeling the other generic sources were Canadian.
Do you think they are playing silly little games? I do. I did write my senators and Representatives and asked them to look into the situation. Maybe they will.

By: Me

Me — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 04:54:59 +0000

“….she said that there is likely a shortage on desiccated thyroid because they are not drugs that are approved by the FDA.”

Oh, my gosh, right. There’s a shortage because it’s not approved. What the heck kind of nonsense is that. Talk about double talk and pure guessing on her part. That doesn’t seem like a response from someone with a brain.

By: Michelle

Michelle — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 04:52:27 +0000

I neglected to state that Lisa was calling me back from a message I left her last week when all sources said to call the FDA. It is not my impression that additional calls would help or that they would glean additional information.

By: Michelle

Michelle — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 04:39:32 +0000

I spoke with Lisa today and she used the word unapproved numerous times. She said they COULD but haven’t taken action against desiccated thyroid. I asked why they possibly might take action against these wonderful and patient proven products and she said that since 1997, they have started to require all unapproved drugs to get approval. Again, I asked – why right now, if this has been a possibility for 11 years. Her reply was that they haven’t yet required such approval but they could. The only positive she said is that there is another process whereby the natural thyroid companies could apply for approval with literature OR a clinical trial. In that literature, they can provide data that isn’t necessarily their own. She didn’t elaborate. I asked if any of this new attention has to do with complaints of the new Armour not working well. She said no. I asked why there is a nationwide shortage at this moment and she said that there is likely a shortage on desiccated thyroid because they are not drugs that are approved by the FDA. I was trying not to get caught up in the hype but that last sentence bothered me big time.