Dear Doctor…

The follo­wing is a TEMPLATE let­ter, mea­ning you can USE and/or MODIFY it, and it’s writ­ten in a polite and infor­ma­tive style. Per­fect to send to your doc­tor before your visit:

You can choose to print it from here and work on it (the logo above will not print), or you can down­load an Open Office Docu­ment copy here

Dear Dr. _________,

I have lear­ned that T4-only thy­ro­xine medi­ca­tions like Synth­roid became a popu­lar treat­ment for hypothy­roid around the 1960’s. I also found out that by the early 70’s, the TSH lab was being used, with a range that has repea­tedly shrunk to detect more cases of hypothy­roid. It all sounds medi­cally advan­ced and good. 

But…I am obser­ving, as are a large body of thy­roid patients, that T4-only medi­ca­tions like Synth­roid, Levoxyl, Levothy­ro­xine, etc are NOT com­ple­tely remo­ving our symp­toms. Neither are our symp­toms remo­ved when we are kept within the TSH range.

Since I have been on _____________, I con­ti­nue to have the follo­wing hypothy­roid symp­toms: (see Chap­ter 1 for the list of symp­toms that match your own. ) I know that you can recom­mend that I inc­rease my ____________, or that I take other presc­rip­tion medi­ca­tions to help my other symp­toms. I also know that you can recom­mend that I add Cyto­mel to my regimen.

But Dr. __________, I would pre­fer to go on a medi­ca­tion called Armour desic­ca­ted thy­roid that is FDA appro­ved, meets the strin­gent gui­de­li­nes of the U.S. Phar­ma­co­peia, and that patients were suc­cess­fully taking before T4-only medi­ca­tions were ever widely used. Armour gives me exactly what my own thy­roid gives me – T4, T3, T2, T1 and cal­ci­to­nin. That makes a lot of sense to me.

I have heard that some doc­tors will say that Armour is unre­gu­la­ted, incon­sis­tent, unre­lia­ble, or out­da­ted. But appa­rently, patients I know who are on Armour are not fin­ding any of those to be true! They state that they feel MUCH bet­ter on Armour than on T4-only medications.

When I start on Armour, it is my unders­tan­ding that one grain or so is a safe star­ting amount. After 1 – 2 weeks on my star­ting dose, I would like to raise my dose approx. 1/2 grain every few weeks accor­ding to the eli­mi­na­tion of symp­toms, and NOT by the TSH range, since the TSH is simply a pitui­tary hor­mone, and thus doesn’t accu­ra­tely mea­sure my thy­roid levels with the addi­tion of oral thy­roid hor­mo­nes. Once I get up to approx. 3 grains, I’d like to hold each dose about 4 – 5 weeks to allow the T4 to build in my sys­tem, and get more accu­rate symp­tom & lab results.

As far as labs, I’d pre­fer to keep track of my free T3 and free T4. Patients on Armour are sta­ting that when they com­ple­tely rid them­sel­ves of symp­toms, they have a free T3 towards the top of the range, a mid-range free T4, and a sup­pres­sed TSH, with no hyper symp­toms wha­tsoe­ver. (When I do labs, I will NOT be taking my Armour ahead of time to give a more accu­rate reflec­tion of my T3 levels.) I will also be split­ting my Armour in two or more doses a day to spread the direct T3 out during the day. 

Also, I’d like to test my adre­nals with a 24-hour adre­nal saliva test rather than a blood or urine test – the for­mer which I can order for myself and which tests my cor­ti­sol at 4 dif­fe­rent times a day. This will help rule out any issues I might have due to low cor­ti­sol. I’d also like to do a Ferri­tin test, since low Ferri­tin (below the 40’s) appears to be com­mon and cau­ses pro­blems as I try to raise my Armour.

Finally, I am hoping that you and I can be a team since I live in my own body and can have my own know­ledge. If you can work with me on the above, I think we can make a fine team.

Sin­ce­rely,

Put your name here.

REMEMBER: you can use only parts of the above, or all of the above. You can take away some of the polite tone, or you can leave it. Make your let­ter YOU.