naturethroid tags

I recei­ved in an email from Sue in Australia.

Sue’s son has com­plex dif­fi­cul­ties with a diag­no­sis of sar­coi­do­sis, an inflam­ma­tion disease that can occur throughout your body. From the disease, says Sue, he was fairly ema­cia­ted, which is com­mon with Sar­coi­do­sis (ema­cia­ted means he was basi­cally “skin and bones”).

He was also born without a thy­roid. So he’s been on com­poun­ded natu­ral desic­ca­ted thy­roid–the way thy­roid is made in Aus­tra­lia – and of course, the filler has been cellulose.

When she read from STTM (see here) about the pro­blems with cellu­lose and the way it binds the desic­ca­ted thy­roid – making the com­poun­ded thy­roid less effec­tive – she approached a bio­me­di­cal doc­tor to have the filler chan­ged to aci­dophi­llus as sug­ges­ted. He ins­tead sug­ges­ted gly­cine pow­der. Gly­cine is a non-essential amino acid and neu­ro­trans­mit­ter which helps with diges­tion, cen­tral ner­vous sys­tem health, besi­des create muscle tis­sue and con­vert glu­cose into energy.

And, says Sue, “the imme­diate reac­tion was start­ling as my son who had been suf­fe­ring from ema­cia­tion for years with a diag­no­sis of sar­coi­do­sis put on over a kilo in much nee­ded weight in the space of little more than a week.” In fact, she now won­ders if much of his pro­blems has been rela­ted to his lack of thy­roid, and the cellu­lose filler making the medi­ca­tion less effec­tive, all along!

Says Sue, “His case is a com­plex one, having been born without a thy­roid gland, but the remo­val of cellu­lose ( or the addi­tion of gly­cine or both) have cer­tainly heral­ded some exci­ting changes”.

She also added, “There must be more to this than meets the eye. I did have to reduce his thy­roid extract dose as I’m assu­ming that the bin­ding effect of the cellu­lose meant he was on a higher dose than neces­sary to get a rea­so­na­ble result and/or perhaps gly­cine enhan­ces absorb­tion. I’m sorry there are still quite a few ques­tions to be ans­we­red and the results of a  blood test in a few weeks time will be inte­res­ting. I’ll keep you updated.”

Bot­tom line: adding cellu­lose as a filler with desic­ca­ted thy­roid has been a disas­ter, as patients dis­co­ve­red after both Armour by Forest Labs and Natu­reth­roid by RLC Labs were refor­mu­la­ted in 2009 and early 2010, respectively.

If you are on either Armour or Natu­reth­roid, make sure you CHEW THE TABLETS UP tho­roughly to release the desic­ca­ted thy­roid from the bin­ding cellu­lose. You can also choose to use a mor­tar and pestle to pul­ve­rize the tablets, and add a touch of honey or sugar, which helps with digestion.

If you are on com­poun­ded desic­ca­ted thy­roid, ask the phar­ma­cist to change the filler to aci­dophi­lus. Or ask about Gly­cine (or L-Glycine) to see if it is good for your par­ti­cu­lar situation.

All good alter­na­ti­ves for thy­roid treat­ment are found here.

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Thank you!! A hearty thank you goes to those who have con­tri­bu­ted to the hos­ting fees for STTM – a patient-to-patient edu­ca­tio­nal site! I can’t do it alone, so you are VERY appre­cia­ted. And if you would like to con­tri­bute to the hos­ting fees (which I do not get: the host ser­ver does), go here.  Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness is YOUR site.

The large size STTM t-shirts are now gone. If you can wear an X-large or XX-large and want to spread the word to others, go here. And the bum­per stic­kers REALLY catch atten­tion!! I am stop­ped in par­king lots because of mine. YOU could change someone’s life!

Vita­min and mine­ral defi­cien­cies:  It’s com­mon for thy­roid patients to be low in iron/ferritin, Vit. D, mag­ne­sium, potas­sium and more. Have you chec­ked your levels lately?

A patient recently repor­ted on Face­book that a par­ti­cu­lar large and well-known health cen­ter in Texas deci­ded to make their own com­poun­ded natu­ral desic­ca­ted thy­roid for their hypothy­roid patients…with cellulose.

Having read my blog posts about wides­pread nega­tive patient expe­rience with cellu­lose, she told the phar­macy that many of us have noti­ced dis­tinct pro­blems with the addi­tion of cellu­lose in our desic­ca­ted thy­roid medi­ca­tions – exactly why the newly for­mu­la­ted Armour cau­sed too many patients to see a return of their hypothy­roid symp­toms. Natu­reth­roid has not esca­ped the same fate for some.

When she asked if they could remove the cellu­lose, she recei­ved a firm and con­des­cen­ding “No” from the phar­ma­cist, refe­rring to cellu­lose as “a com­mon ingre­dient in many medi­ca­tions and not a problem.”

Not a pro­blem? Once again, patients are dis­mis­sed as if we couldn’t pos­sibly know what works, and what doesn’t work, in our treat­ment and in our own bodies. A sha­me­ful rea­lity. She left disap­poin­ted. 

What is cellu­lose? Cellu­lose is the most com­mon orga­nic subs­tance found on our pla­net – a fiber abun­dantly found in plants and trees, and most espe­cially in cotton.

Where is cellu­lose used? You wear it and you write on it! You eat it when you con­sume celery, pota­toes, or mush­rooms. It’s used to sta­bi­lize and thic­ken pro­ces­sed foods, and may be found in many chee­ses, dry milk, pud­dings, and more. And since it’s dif­fi­cult to find anyone aller­gic to wood, it’s been a com­mon ingre­dient in medi­ca­tions, used as a filler.

So where’s the pro­blem for thy­roid patients?

1. Unlike the happy cows in their pas­tu­res che­wing their cuds, human sto­machs  have a limi­ted abi­lity to break cellu­lose down. Cellu­lose is a fiber. And what does fiber do? It “binds”. It binds to the desic­ca­ted thy­roid that has gone down with it.  i.e. the life-changing effects of desic­ca­ted thy­roid are clearly dam­pe­ned by the pre­sence of cellu­lose. Our “expe­rience” has revea­led it all across the globe since Armour was refor­mu­la­ted with an inc­rease of cellu­lose in the mix.  i.e. we have wit­nes­sed a mas­sive return of hypothy­roid symp­toms on the newly for­mu­la­ted Armour, and to some degree, on Natu­reth­roid, whether the lat­ter switched to mic­rocrys­ta­lline cellu­lose or not (as com­pa­red to the lar­ger celled methylcellulose).
2. Hypothy­roid patients do not digest well. As one of many com­pli­ca­tions of hypothy­roi­dism,  espe­cially due to the ina­de­quate treat­ment of T4-only medi­ca­tions and poor diag­no­sis from the TSH lab test,  low sto­mach acid and poor diges­tion is COMMON in hypothy­roid patients.  So when you add cellu­lose to the mix, you are further dam­ning thy­roid patients.
3. Though not spe­ci­fic to just thy­roid patients, we are not too com­for­ta­ble with fin­ding out that cellu­lose can collect in our lungs, as revea­led in pub­med artic­les here and here.  (Thanks to thy­roid patient Danny for aler­ting me to this.)

Bot­tom line, desic­ca­ted thy­roid is a qua­lity and supe­rior treat­ment medi­ca­tion which has chan­ged the lives ten-fold for thy­roid patients around the world.

But cellu­lose and desic­ca­ted thy­roid DO NOT MIX. And BRAVO to those com­poun­ding phar­ma­cies who have lis­te­ned and have used the bene­fi­cial pro­bio­tic aci­dophi­lus as a filler. We appre­ciate you.

P.S. I abso­lu­tely loved this com­ment made by another patient on Face­book when we were dis­cus­sing the grief of taking our last pre-formulated Armour: Would love to get my hands on some old Armour again.…those were the days my friends…

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Want to know your options for bet­ter thy­roid treat­ment?? Go here.

Need help fin­ding a good doc­tor? Go here.

Think desic­ca­ted thy­roid didn’t work for you?? Go here.

See com­mon Ques­tions and Ans­wers here.

In case you are mis­sing com­ments on my pre­vious posts, there is a poten­tial solu­tion to the pro­blems encoun­te­red with both the refor­mu­la­ted Armour by Forest Labs, and the refor­mu­la­ted Natu­reth­roid by RLC.

Namely, by either crushing your tablet with a mor­tar and pestle, or che­wing it up in little pie­ces, patients are star­ting to report far bet­ter symp­tom relief!! i.e., this pro­cess is pro­bably brea­king down the ridi­cu­lous coa­tings and cellu­lose and allo­wing your body bet­ter access to the desic­ca­ted thy­roid within.

And if you just can’t sto­mach the pul­ve­ri­zed pill method, add a touch of honey to the pow­der, and lick it all up.

Let us know how it works for you!

Want to see the newest Ques­tion & Ans­wer page on STTM? Go here.

PREVIOUS BLOG POSTS:

To read my Edi­to­rial Res­ponse, go here (or if you are rea­ding this on the blog, right below)
To read my infor­mal sur­vey on the new Armour, go here.
To read UK Sheila Turner’s Guest post on those who cri­ti­cize self-treatment, go here.
10 rea­sons thy­roid patients are frus­tra­ted, angry and sick, here.

It’s been about a year since Armour desic­ca­ted thy­roid, a very popu­lar presc­rip­tion natu­ral thy­roid pro­duct on the mar­ket for deca­des, was refor­mu­la­ted. Forest Labs sta­ted there were two chan­ges: the rai­sing of cellu­lose, and the lowe­ring of sucrose.

Why did they do this? It could be strongly rela­ted to the fact that in late 2007 through 2008, patients who used the 3 grain tablets repor­ted they were sud­denly and enti­rely inef­fec­tive. So, many of us sur­mise that Forest was attemp­ting to “improve” (cough) their product.

Says one of those patients:  I had switched to the 3 grain tablet months before to save money and I used my pill cut­ter to cut it in half.  Then around Novem­ber, my work pants were get­ting tight and I would come home tired, achy and weak. It didn’t take me long to figure out that Armour in the 3 grain was now like a sugar pill!

In the mean­time, Forest brought out the newly for­mu­la­ted Armour, & patients who finished their old batch star­ted the new batch. And since then, it appears a large body of patients have run as fast as they could to Natu­reth­roid, or com­poun­ded, or T4/T3 or Erfa. The rea­son: a return of for­mer hypo symp­toms on the “new” Armour.

I have com­ple­ted an infor­mal sur­vey with 24 indi­vi­duals res­pon­ding, and asked the follo­wing ques­tions. After each ques­tion, I give a sum­mary of the answers.

1. How long of doing well occu­rred on the newly refor­mu­la­ted Armour before you star­ted to notice that you weren’t doing well?

Most ans­wers are in the area of 2 – 3 months, with three saying a month, one 4 months, and three sta­ting a few weeks. And com­pa­ring this to com­ments we’ve been seeing for the past year on patient groups, it’s com­mon to feel good at first, but to crash within that 2 – 3 months.

2. What clued you in that you weren’t doing well on the new Armour?

The ans­wers are all over the map: fati­gue and exhaus­tion, hair loss, brain fog, weight gain, slee­ping pro­blems, cons­ti­pa­tion, achi­ness, depres­sion, hor­mo­nal pro­blems, moo­di­ness, dry skin/elbows/thumbs and crac­king skin, fla­king fin­ger­nails, heart irre­gu­la­rity, for­get­ful­ness. Five report skin brea­kouts simi­lar to poi­son ivy.  Fati­gue and hair loss were the most com­mon answers.

3. Did you try rai­sing it? What were the results?

The majo­rity tried rai­sing it, and results were: no results; barely made any dif­fe­rence: more energy but skin was a mess. The majo­rity said nothing hap­pe­ned. Two dou­bled it with no sig­ni­fi­cant results.  Two deve­lo­ped fast heart rate with no impro­ve­ments elsewhere. One had to lower it because of a very low TSH. One sta­ted she rai­sed it to get her labs back up to where they were before…with little impro­ve­ments.  And one said it made her too hot to con­ti­nue rai­sing it.

4. Did you try adding T3 to it? What were the results?

All said no. One said she tes­ted here RT3 ratio and it was 11, which is bad.  One sta­ted she asked her doc­tor for T3; he said no. I’d sure like to find someone who did add T3 who could tell us the results.

5. Did you do anything else to try and make the refor­mu­la­ted Armour work, and did it help?

All repor­ted nothing hel­ped enough.  Many sta­ted their doc­tors tes­ted for other pro­blems, ran­ging from heavy metals, low iodine, B12 – the lat­ter hel­ped one gal’s tin­gling. One sta­ted her doc put her on Apro­to­col for the diges­tive tract which hel­ped the cons­ti­pa­tion but nothing else chan­ged. One added com­poun­ded desic­ca­ted thy­roid to her Armour — it didn’t help. One gal tried Thyro-care, which hel­ped. But she and two others report get­ting a poison-ivy like skin rash on the new Armour.

Currently, we see newly diag­no­sed patients put on the new Armour, and vete­rans can’t help but won­der what will hap­pen to them.

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On my April 17^th blog post, read 10 rea­sons thy­roid patients are still frus­tra­ted, angry and sick. That is follo­wed by the April 19^th blog post Should thy­roid patients avoid self-treatment at all costs, with an inte­res­ting and strong Guest Post by Sheila Tur­ner of TPA-UK and a good follo­wup to the for­mer 10 rea­sons post.

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If you appre­ciate the infor­ma­tion you receive from this patient-to-patient web­site, please con­si­der making a dona­tion to sup­port the hos­ting costs for this Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness web­site. The icon is on the lower right.

It’s a con­ti­nuing tra­vesty, and you see it in patient groups.

i.e. many patients still find them­sel­ves sick and disa­bled, stum­bling mise­rably from one unin­for­med doc­tor to another…in spite of the won­ders of natu­ral desic­ca­ted thy­roid, the tes­ti­mony of chan­ged lives, the edu­ca­tion of patients thanks to the STTM web­site & book, and a small but gro­wing body of wise doc­tors who seem to be “get­ting it”,

So what’s the pro­blem?? It lays with our doc­tors and the entire medi­cal pro­fes­sion.

1. Heavy-handed con­trol over your medi­ca­tion: You go to pick up your presc­rip­tion, and find your medi­ca­tion has been lowe­red by your doc­tor without your agree­ment or know­ledge, as hap­pe­ned to Terry here (scroll down to find her post).
2. Igno­rance about adre­nal fati­gue and treat­ment: You clearly have an adre­nal pro­blem, and one doc­tor dis­mis­ses its exis­tence, another doc­tor poo-poos the saliva test, another doc­tor tells you cor­ti­sol sup­ple­men­ta­tion is dan­ge­rous, another doc­tor thrusts all his her­bal sup­ple­ments at you, another doc­tor thinks that 5 or 10 mg cor­ti­sol is enough…and on and on and on.
3. Dis­mis­sing the Ferri­tin test: You want to know what your ferri­tin is, but the doctor’s nurse unders­co­res that they’ve already chec­ked your iron levels, so there’s no need for more testing.
4. Dis­mis­sing you: You are wise thanks to rea­ding, researching and living in your own body, yet your doc­tor calls you a pro­ble­ma­tic patient on your charts, dis­mis­ses you, or gets angry.
5. RT3 huh? You have strong sus­pi­cions that your Reverse T3 is too high thanks to adre­nal fati­gue, low ferri­tin, undiag­no­sed glu­ten issues, or other rea­sons, yet this doc­tor refu­ses to test you, that doc­tor says an RT3 excess is rare.
6. Look at me! Look at me! You make an appoint­ment with that great doc who has a fabu­lous website/book and who shouts that he uses desic­ca­ted thy­roid with a big smile…yet any or all of the above and below occurs with him/her or his “trai­ned” associates.
7. Con­ti­nued worship of the TSH lab test:  Too many doc­tors still think the TSH lab test is from God Almighty. So when you finally start to feel well on desic­ca­ted thy­roid with a TSH at zero or below…WHAM…you must lower your meds because you are somehow “hyper” in spite of no symp­toms to match.
8. Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal addicts: You men­tion your lin­ge­ring hypothy­roid symp­toms, and you are ban­dai­ded with anti-depressants, anti-anxietal meds, sta­tins, BP pills, pain tablets, acid reflux pills, cal­cium for your thin­ning bones…instead of unders­tand that these are ALL side effects of poor treat­ment or undis­co­ve­red issues.
9. The country you live in: The des­pe­ra­tion of UK thy­roid patients is deep thanks to a thy­roid asso­cia­tion and a College of Phy­si­cians which tigh­tens the screws if a doc­tor dares to presc­ribe a life chan­ging medi­ca­tion with T3 in it.  Or just as frus­tra­ting, having a govern­ment which for­bids desic­ca­ted thy­roid to arrive to you in the mail.
10. Refor­mu­la­tions and Big Pharma apathy: Forest Labs tur­ned one of the most popu­lar and effec­tive desic­ca­ted thy­roid brand, Armour, into a pill with too much cellu­lose and too little suc­rose , cau­sing a mas­sive return of symp­toms in many, soo­ner or later. RLC also refor­mu­la­ted their Natu­reth­roid, and though some patients still do well on it, others do mise­rably, and we are left won­de­ring WHAT to take. (Thank God for Erfa’s Cana­dian “Thy­roid”, but will we be able to con­ti­nue with this fabu­lous desic­ca­ted thy­roid product?)

And there are more rea­sons you might want to bring up in the Com­ments part of this post.

So you see, it’s no won­der so MANY patients feel for­ced to self-treat, yet they are also con­dem­ned for doing so. I refuse to con­demn them for exactly the rea­sons above.  Petty. All I ask is that we all try to find a good doc, but it may be quite hard when you con­si­der all the above.

All-in-all, we still have  a way to go, baby, and espe­cially with the doc­tors we try so hard to get help from…but can’t.

P.S. Are you brave? Walk into your doctor’s office with the STTM shirt.