cholesterol tags

I’ve been sit­ting back silently, rea­ding all the bac­klash that star­ted with Newsweek’s Best Life or Risky Advice May 30^th article, a cri­ti­cal analy­sis of Oprah’s mul­ti­ple pro­gram topics of Wish Away Can­cer! Get A Lunch­time Face-Lift! Era­di­cate Autism! Turn Back The Clock! Thin Your Thighs! Cure Meno­pause! Har­ness Posi­tive Energy! Erase Wrin­kles! Banish Obe­sity! Live Your Best Life Ever!

And gran­ted, some of the cri­ti­cism seems jus­ti­fied.

Even thy­roid patients win­ced and squir­med when Oprah sta­ted that a month long Hawaiian vaca­tion and eating fresh foods with soy milk were a great way to treat her thy­roid con­di­tion.  Uh huh.   Patients equally gag­ged at her sup­port of Dr. Chris­tiane North­rup who made the the nutty insen­si­tive com­ment that our thy­roid pro­blems were due to an “energy bloc­kage in the throat region, the result of a life­time of ‘swa­llo­wing’ words one is aching to say.”

But the ensuing array of blog posts and artic­les follo­wing in the foots­teps of the News­week cri­ti­cism of Oprah has pre­sen­ted quite an irony for thy­roid patients whose lives have been chan­ged thanks to natu­ral desic­ca­ted thy­roid. Adjec­ti­ves and/or desc­rip­tions of Oprah in these blogs and artic­les have included:

* dan­ge­rous

* pedd­ling alter­na­tive treat­ments that are ineffective

* fai­ling to pre­sent scien­ti­fic evidence

* fai­ling to lis­ten to bona fide, medi­cal school trai­ned,  medi­cal professionals

* being too gulli­ble about the so-called wis­dom and know­ledge of cer­tain patients (ala Suzanne Somers)

* fai­ling to give more atten­tion to science-based, sta­tus quo, mains­tream medicine

Any of the above sound fami­liar? Yup, it sure does.

How many times have thy­roid patients been told that desic­ca­ted thy­roid like Armour or Natu­reth­roid was dan­ge­rous, or rai­sing it by symp­toms rather than the TSH was dan­ge­rous. Or it’s dan­ge­rous to use because you’ll get heart pro­blems and oste­ro­po­ro­sis. Yet thy­roid patients on desic­ca­ted thy­roid have their lives CHANGED, with stron­ger hearts and inc­rea­sed bone density.

How many patients have had their doc­tors tell them that desic­ca­ted was inef­fec­tive as an alter­na­tive out-dated pro­duct, yet these same patients star­ted to LIVE again with relief from old symp­toms from this inef­fec­tive “alter­na­tive” medi­ca­tion that grandma once used.

How many artic­les by medi­cal pro­fes­sio­nals are there who claim that there’s no scien­ti­fic evi­dence to prove that desic­ca­ted thy­roid is effec­tive, in spite of CLEAR obser­va­tion and reports of a huge and gro­wing body of thy­roid patients and cer­tain doc­tors around the world about relief from depres­sion, lowe­red cho­les­te­rol, bet­ter blood pres­sure, weight main­te­nance, hair regrowth, bet­ter sta­mina, less sick­ness and a myriad of other improvements!

How many bona fide, medi­cal school trai­ned,  medi­cal pro­fes­sio­nals told us ad nau­seum that our symp­toms were not thy­roid rela­ted (when they were), that we are “nor­mal” because the TSH lab test says so (when we were far from it), that desic­ca­ted thy­roid is out­da­ted, unre­lia­ble, inef­fec­tive, and a ten ton load of other ridi­cu­lous com­ments from bona fide, medi­cal school trai­ned,  medi­cal professionals.

How many doc­tors have told patients that they should NOT lis­ten to other patients on the inter­net or Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness because patients can’t pos­sibly have any wis­dom or know what they are tal­king about. Yet, lo and behold, it’s been patients and what they have lear­ned who have star­ted a wide-reaching revo­lu­tion for bet­ter thy­roid treat­ment that works, and a gro­wing body of doc­tors are listening!

And how many times has science-based, sta­tus quo, mains­tream medi­cine com­ple­tely rui­ned the lives of thy­roid patients because many doc­tors are too lazy to dare ques­tion or think outside the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal, medi­cal school box.

Yup, Oprah has made some blun­ders, gaf­fes and mis­judg­ments as out­li­ned in the News­week article.  She has gushed too quickly when North­rup opens her mouth or Oz walks in with his sur­gi­cal garb.  But isn’t it a bit iro­nic that some of the cri­ti­cism by others towards Oprah are the same blun­ders, gaf­fes and mis­judg­ments which most any thy­roid patient has heard about their use of desic­ca­ted thy­roid, and which has all been COMPLETELY wrong.

Bot­tom line, for every mis­take and mis­judg­ment Oprah has made – and CLEARLY she has done so in her unders­tan­ding of thy­roid treat­ment — she just might be ope­ning the doors to medi­cal truth, somewhere, somehow, bet­ween it all.

Janie

Thy­roid pro­blems have become rampant.

And it’s not just in the US with indi­vi­duals like Oprah, fit­ness guru Jillian Michaels, Sex and the City’s Kim Cat­trall, George and Bar­bara Bush, Kelly Osbourne and others.  A recent article in the Daily Mail-UK high­lights the saga of  Clare Bal­ding, the BBC TV sports pre­sen­ter in the UK whose thy­roid was gladly remo­ved due to a malig­nant tumor.

Even the gal who wrote the well-written article about Clare, Pippa Jolly, reports having gone through the same remo­val 13 years pre­vious due to an extreme case of Hashi­mo­tos and a nodule pres­sing against her trachea.

But within the infor­ma­tive and hope­ful tone of the article are a few Rod­ney Dan­ger­field thuds of the con­ti­nuing SCANDAL and idiocy of a par­ti­cu­lar thy­roid treat­ment which even the most inno­cent of article wri­ters can be fooled.

Thud #1: The very first sen­tence of the article says: Some good news for Clare Bal­ding, the BBC TV sports pre­sen­ter, is that her recent ope­ra­tion to remove her can­ce­rous thy­roid gland — a thy­roi­dec­tomy — should be the end of the matter.

End of the mat­ter? Only if she had been put on desic­ca­ted thy­roid like Natu­reth­roid, et al. Because it appears she’s on the delight­fully enchan­ting synthe­tic “thy­ro­xine”, the dar­ling of most UK doc­tors and which ser­ves to leave almost ever­yone with their own brand and inten­sity of con­ti­nuing hypothy­roid symp­toms.  You can lis­ten to my audio here about T4.

Thud #2: Diag­nos­tic rates are on the inc­rease, says Pro­fes­sor Mon­son, as thy­roid tests are now done rou­ti­nely at GP sur­ge­ries. ‘As a result there is a higher detec­tion rate and the disease can be tac­kled ear­lier and if neces­sary follo­wed up by surgery.

Right. Those inc­rea­sing diag­nos­tic rates, some which are based on the lousy TSH lab test, are ove­rri­dingly catching someone’s hypothy­roid state years after it star­ted, which lea­ves a cer­tain per­cen­tage with the misery of adre­nal insuf­fi­ciency and host of other pro­blems from being undiag­no­sed so long.  And if one is trea­ted after sur­gery based on the same holy TSH, you will only con­ti­nue to have your brand of con­ti­nuing symp­toms. You can lis­ten to my audio on the TSH here.

Thud #3: If the thy­roid is remo­ved or not func­tio­ning pro­perly, thy­ro­xine will need to be taken in drug form for life.

You and millions of others have been hood­win­ked into thin­king it’s thy­ro­xine you will need the rest of your life, aka Eltro­xine, Synth­roid, or levothy­ro­xine,  et al.  But those T4 meds force you to depend on con­ver­sion alone, a pro­cess not well done in many, and you miss out on what natu­ral desic­ca­ted thy­roid would be giving you as a much wiser treat­ment–exactly what your own thy­roid gives: direct T4, T3, T2, T1 and cal­ci­to­nin. Or even at the VERY least, giving your­self synthe­tic T4 with synthe­tic T3.

Thud #4: Now I have to have my hor­mone levels chec­ked every three months and make sure I take my medi­ca­tion, but other­wise I feel fine.

I com­ple­tely believe Pippa when she says she feels fine. But I want to warn her:  some CAN feel fine on a T4-only medi­ca­tion, but even­tually and espe­cially as she ages,  she’s going to have to watch out for those pesky little demons of being on an infe­rior, ina­de­quate medi­ca­tion, which can inc­lude rising cho­les­te­rol, chro­nic low-grade depres­sion, rising high blood pres­sure, or a host of other symp­toms which are indi­vi­dual to each per­son on thyroxine.

Here’s hoping Clare and Pippa join the gro­wing body of patients all over the world whose lives are being chan­ged thanks to natu­ral desic­ca­ted thyroid.

*Want to be infor­med of these blog posts? Curious what I’m ran­ting about now? Use the Noti­fi­ca­tions on the lower left of the links.

With the recent blog post by health wri­ter Mary Sho­mon con­cer­ning Dr. Sid­ney Wolfe’s new 4-year term with the FDA’s Drug Safety and Risk Mana­ge­ment Advi­sory Com­mit­tee, there has been much brooha and fear-mongering on thy­roid patient groups.

Why? Well look at it this way. This is a man of sta­ture. He is an MD, an Adjunct Pro­fes­sor of Medi­cine, the direc­tor of Public Citizen’s health research group which pro­mo­tes drug safety and public health, and edi­tor of the news­let­ter Worst Pills, Best Pills, and since August of  ’08, a mem­ber of the Drug Safety Com­mit­tee.  He also has a resume a mile long.

Yet in spite of his see­mingly caring acti­vism for our health and well-being, and his immense expe­rience and edu­ca­tion, he is clearly and com­ple­tely off-base about Armour and other desic­ca­ted thy­roid presc­rip­tion drugs.

For exam­ple, as as edi­tor of the Worst Pills, Best Pills news­let­ter,  Wolfe dec­la­red Armour desic­ca­ted thy­roid as a “Do Not Use” pro­duct because it is not ade­qua­tely gua­ran­teed to pro­vide appro­priate blood levels of thy­roid hor­mone and relia­ble alter­na­ti­ves are avai­la­ble”. (Gee, funny how our expe­rien­ces are com­ple­tely other­wise.…)

Then in the May 2003 issue (of which you have to have a paid presc­rip­tion to read), he wrote an article tit­led  “Do Not Use! Natu­ral or Desic­ca­ted Thy­roid (ARMOUR THYROID) For Thy­roid Hor­mone Repla­ce­ment The­rapy.” In that article, the clue­less Wolfe sta­ted that he sup­por­ted The Ame­ri­can Thy­roid Association’s sta­te­ment “There is no evi­dence that desic­ca­ted thy­roid, a bio­lo­gi­cal pre­pa­ra­tion, has any advan­tage over synthe­tic thy­ro­xine.” (I guess millions of us and our impro­ved hear­trate, sta­mina, cho­les­te­rol, depres­sion and more…aren’t evi­dence?)

He then pro­po­ses that Armour is mostly presc­ri­bed for weight loss, is a niche mar­ket for the unsc­ru­pu­lous, and conc­lu­des with “if you are offe­red natu­ral thy­roid hor­mone repla­ce­ment treat­ment for any rea­son, this is a red flag and you should get a second opi­nion.” In a let­ter to con­su­mers, Wolfe and Public Citi­zen state that that T3 is only nee­ded from con­ver­sion and is pre­dic­tably found from con­ver­sion, that the T2 and T1 also found in desic­ca­ted thy­roid has essen­tially no acti­vity, that desic­ca­ted thy­roid is an unpre­dic­ta­ble mix­ture, that is has no pre­dic­ta­ble bio­lo­gi­cal acti­vity…plus so many more com­plete and total inac­cu­ra­cies based on “inte­llec­tual head chat­ter” not on obser­va­tion and experience.

Thud.

Mary Sho­mon, in 2003, did a bang-up job trying to com­mu­ni­cate with Wolfe, Worst Pills, Best Pills, and Public Citi­zen about the inac­cu­ra­cies of their beliefs and statements…basically to no avail. The TRUTH is here, and in more detail in Chap­ters 1 and 2 in the STTM book which are enligh­te­ning those rea­ding it all!

So we are left won­de­ring, six years later, what his four-year appoint­ment to this com­mit­tee will mean. But let’s make a few things quite clear to con­trast some of the fears going on and expres­sed on thy­roid groups:

1) Armour is not being ban­ned.
2) Wolfe is one of a current 9 mem­bers of this com­mit­tee. Wolfe is not “the com­mit­tee”.
3) Wolfe and seven others currently have voting rights. He is the only “Con­su­mer Repre­sen­ta­tive”.
4) There are still six more vacan­cies.
5) The com­mit­tee is NOT the power. They simply make recom­men­da­tions. And his­to­ri­cally, the FDA can be slow to act on their recom­men­da­tions, or doesn’t follow them at all (which is a GOOD thing when it comes to a SAFE and EFFECTIVE medi­ca­tion like desic­ca­ted thyroid).

So what can you do? I cha­llenge you to follow and act on the below, which puts our ener­gies into com­mu­ni­ca­tion, not fee­ding the ego and power of a mis­gui­ded man with our overtly expres­sed fears as if they have actually come to pass :

1) Remem­ber 1 – 5 above. Armour is fully avai­la­ble. Keep the facts straight, and fear-mongering down.

2) STTM has a power­ful and gro­wing page of tes­ti­mo­nies of those who switched to desic­ca­ted thy­roid.  Are you in there? If not, you need to be. This web­site currently has a huge audience. It’s noti­ced by doc­tors all over the world, as is the STTM book, which is YOUR book of YOUR expe­rien­ces,  which is also being orde­red by doc­tors. Use the Con­tact Me form at the bot­tom of that page.

3) Tell your expe­rience with Synth­roid or other thy­ro­xine medi­ca­tions at the follo­wing web­si­tes:  www.rateadrug.com,  www.drugs.com,  www.askapatient.com They don’t inc­lude any of the desic­ca­ted thy­roid meds yet, but you can tell of the nega­tive expe­rien­ces with all the T4-only drugs, inc­lu­ding adre­nal fati­gue if you fell into that, and all your lin­ge­ring thy­roid symp­toms.  The above links will take you to their Synth­roid page – you can search for the other T4 meds.  Remem­ber to men­tion Armour or other desic­ca­ted thy­roid meds and how they have hel­ped you!! Update: thy­roid patient Gina found the drugs.com Armour page: http://www.drugs.com/comments/thyroid-desiccated/armour-thyroid.html

4) Report your T4-only expe­rience to Med­Watch, the FDA’s  pro­gram for repor­ting pro­blems.  You will see an Online Repor­ting Form to down­load. Don’t fail to men­tion which pro­blems were remo­ved or greatly impro­ved when you switched to Armour, or the fact that you now have to deal with adre­nal fati­gue thanks to the ina­de­quacy of T4-only treat­ment. You can also call 1 – 800-FDA-1088, but remem­ber: your call is not to draw atten­tion to Wolfe’s opi­nions! It’s to draw atten­tion to how lousy a treat­ment T4 is as com­pa­red to how much bet­ter Armour has been.

5) Go to my article tit­led Synth­roid Sucks: the Rall­ying Cry of Thy­roid Patients vs. Clue­less Doc­tors and com­ment on this article, inc­lu­ding men­tio­ning what Armour, Natu­reth­roid or other desic­ca­ted thy­roid did for you. Rate it as well. Both keep this article in the media and in the eyes of others.

6) Go to www.medications.com where patients ask ques­tions and YOU can ans­wer, men­tio­ning YOUR expe­rience and how much bet­ter desic­ca­ted thy­roid has been. Clic­king on that will take you to the Synth­roid patient ques­tions. Ans­wer them. Be care­ful with links – they may not catch them at first, but will remove them if they do.  You can men­tion web­site names, tho, like Stop the Thy­roid Madness.

7) Send peo­ple here to follow all these steps. Power is in numbers!

8 ) Use the follo­wing web­site to email or write your sena­tors and repre­sen­ta­ti­ves: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/ THEY DO READ THEM. And they will remem­ber this!  Here’s a tem­plate let­ter you can use:  www.stopthethyroidmadness.com/template-letter-to-your-senator-or-representive/

If you have other ideas and pla­ces to write or call, add your com­ment to this post. Remem­ber,  put your power in com­mu­ni­ca­tion! LOTS of communication.

P.S. Did you know that the Ame­ri­can Thy­roid Asso­cia­tion, in coo­pe­ra­tion with the Ame­ri­can Asso­cia­tion of Endoc­ri­no­lo­gists, together sup­port January as “Thy­roid Awa­re­ness Month”…which is sup­por­ted through an unres­tric­ted grant from Abbott Labo­ra­to­ries, the makers of Synth­roid?? Major UGH.

The Bri­tish Medi­cal Jour­nal (BMJ) recently came out with yet another thy­roid article, benignly tit­led Diag­no­sis and treat­ment of pri­mary hypothy­roi­dism and autho­red by the Bri­tish Thy­roid Asso­cia­tion (BTA),  that at first blush, looks so caring.

Namely, they express deep con­cern that that since hypothy­roid symp­toms can mimic other con­di­tions, patients may be get­ting an inco­rrect diag­no­sis which could expose some patients to the harm­ful effects of excess thy­roid hor­mo­nes, while other serious con­di­tions may go undiagnosed.

And they add: In other patients, ade­quate repla­ce­ment with levothy­ro­xine does not resolve symp­toms, which are attri­bu­ted to hypothy­roi­dism rather than other con­di­tions that may coe­xist, such as depression.

The article con­ti­nues with:  Nor­ma­li­sa­tion of thy­roid sti­mu­la­ting hor­mone means a return to nor­mal health in most patients with pri­mary hypothy­roi­dism.

In other words, what you have above are the Three Stoo­ges of the sta­ted beliefs of the Bri­tish Thy­roid Association.

Stooge stated-belief #1: “Inco­rrect diag­no­sis allow other con­di­tions go undiag­no­sed” What is infe­rred is that there are a host of diag­no­ses of hypothy­roi­dism that are inco­rrect. Why? Because a wise phy­si­cian dared to lis­ten to clear symp­toms of hypothy­roi­dism or use the free T3, in spite of a so-called “nor­mal” TSH – a lab test which mea­su­res a pitui­tary hor­mone, not the cells abi­lity to receive enough thy­roid hormones.

Stooge stated-belief #2: “If ade­quate doses of levothy­ro­xine do not resolve symp­toms, those symp­toms are due to something else.” That is akin to saying if eating 100 calo­ries a day results in mal­nu­tri­tion and star­va­tion, your mal­nu­tri­tion and star­va­tion is due to something else. And one par­ti­cu­lar symp­tom they are refe­rring to is depres­sion–a clas­sic symp­tom of undiag­no­sed and under­trea­ted hypothy­roi­dism in MILLIONS of indi­vi­duals around the world.  And isn’t it just odd how that depres­sion resol­ves itself when the patient is put on Armour and allo­wed to dose by the eli­mi­na­tion of symptoms.

Stooge stated-belief #3: “A nor­mal TSH lab result equals nor­mal health in those trea­ted for hypothy­roi­dism”. Gee, funny how millions of thy­roid patients around the world have had a so-called “nor­mal” TSH lab result along with a diverse blend of con­ti­nuing and CLEAR hypothy­roid symp­toms.  Addi­tio­nally, we have a large and gro­wing body of patients who, when they switched to Armour desic­ca­ted thy­roid or other fine desic­ca­ted thy­roid presc­rip­tion meds,  had those symp­toms resol­ved when they were dosed accor­ding to the free T3, impro­ved blood pres­sure, strong heart beat, lowe­red cho­les­te­rol, and com­plete eli­mi­na­tion of symp­toms. Patients have lear­ned what works!

When you unders­tand the Bri­tish Thy­roid Association’s hell-bent and rigid stands against Armour desic­ca­ted thy­roid, their pro­mo­tion of one of the worst labs ever crea­ted to diag­nose and dose by, their love affair with the most ina­de­quate thy­roid medi­ca­tion ever thrust onto the mar­ket by money-grubbing phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals (levothy­ro­xine), and their com­plete fai­lure to lis­ten to patients and recog­nize con­ti­nuing symp­toms of hypothy­roi­dism while on synthe­tic T4, you come to rea­lize how mea­ning­ful any article on hypothy­roi­dism will be by the Bri­tish Thy­roid Association.

P.S.  Do ya won­der if the Bri­tish Broad­cas­ting Cor­po­ra­tion (BBC) has the smarts to report the other side of the story??

*Want to be infor­med of these blog posts? Curious what’s on Janie’s mind? Just use the Noti­fi­ca­tion fea­ture on the bot­tom  of the links to your left.

And again, on the heels of my post below about Sheila Tur­ner of the UK’s TPA (be sure and read it – good com­ments, too) comes a blog post by Dr. Richard B. Gut­ler of Cali­for­nia, an Endoc­ri­no­lo­gist (why are we not sur­pri­sed).  And his message?

1) That the NHS is correct to ban Armour

2) That Armour is a “second drug” that cau­ses harm.

3) That it’s only “fringe” patients who don’t do well on T4

4) That none of the above patients are hypothyroid

5) That they don’t feel well on T4 because of other reasons

6) The­rapy is not nee­ded if the TSH is below 10

You know what patients have a fan­tasy about, Dr. Gut­ler?? That folks like YOU become hypothy­roid and are put on T4. You’ll then have to eat dirt as you see your blood pres­sure rising, or your cho­les­te­rol doing the same, or depres­sion and fati­gue set­ting in, or your adre­nals over­wor­king, or weight gain and a host of other con­ti­nuing symp­toms of hypothy­roid while on T4. OH WAIT. Those are all due to something else. Gee, let’s put you on anti-depressants, sta­tins, blood pres­sure meds, pain meds, anti-anxiety meds since those “other” rea­sons never seem to be fixed.  OH WAIT. They DO get fixed when these same patients are switched to Armour or any other desic­ca­ted thy­roid, and have addres­sed their low cor­ti­sol or low ferri­tin thanks to years of undiag­no­sis or under­treat­ment with T4.

SHAME ON YOU.

p.s. It’s because of opi­nions like yours that the Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness book has been sent to patients in over 16 coun­tries, so far. Peo­ple want to find out the TRUTH.

Update: you can read Sheila’s and UK-TPA’s res­ponse here: http://www.stopthethyroidmadness.com/uk-tpas-response-to-the-rcp/

See more from Sheila that gives UK patients hope: http://www.stopthethyroidmadness.com/relationship-between-the-RCP-and-MHRA/

Want to be noti­fied of my blog posts? Curious what’s on my mind? Use the Noti­fi­ca­tion method to be infor­med. Look on the bot­tom left of the links where you can sign up. )