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I con­fess that I hated my Che­mistry class in high school, even if Mr. Bowen tried to make it inte­res­ting and favo­red the girls over the boys in class.  But lo and behold, one of those ele­ments on the Perio­dic Table ended up having a sig­ni­fi­cant role in all or our lives as thy­roid patients: iodine.

Iodine can be found in every inch your body, but is espe­cially pre­va­lent in your thy­roid, which makes it an inte­res­ting ele­ment for those of us with thy­roid disease.  The active thy­roid hor­mone T3 (triio­dothy­ro­nine) is made up of three iodine mole­cu­les, and the sto­rage hor­mone T4 (thy­ro­xine) has four iodine mole­cu­les. In fact, without pro­per amounts of iodine, your thy­roid wouldn’t even func­tion well.

An opti­mal amount of iodine has also been shown to improve breast health, pro­vide can­cer pro­tec­tion, remove toxins like Bro­mide, fluo­ride, mer­cury etc…and in some cases, has hel­ped thy­roid patients either lower their dose, or even get off thy­roid treat­ment. Thy­roid patient Diana tells of get­ting off thy­roid treat­ment due to iodine on the Sto­ries of Others page.

***This Thurs­day eve­ning on the Thy­roid Patient Com­mu­nity Call on TalkShoe, we’ll have guest Stepha­nie Buist, owner of the Yahoo group Iodine and a 9-year thy­roid can­cer sur­vi­vor who strongly feels iodine has been a huge fac­tor.   We’ll explore how much iodine a per­son needs, the loa­ding loa­ding test, the best sour­ces of iodine sup­ple­men­ta­tion, whether you need iodine, as well as con­tro­ver­sies with iodine use, inc­lu­ding Hashi­mo­tos disease or bad reac­tions.  Times for the call are 6 pm Paci­fic, 7 pm Moun­tain, 8 pm Cen­tral and 9 pm Eas­tern. You can lis­ten right on your com­pu­ter, or call to talk directly to Stepha­nie and Janie. Join us!

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Sheila Tur­ner of TPA-UK  (Thy­roid Patient Advocacy-UK www.tpa-uk.org.uk) is star­ting the ball rolling on something very inte­res­ting:  they have con­tac­ted a lab in the UK who will do a qua­li­ta­tive analy­sis of the old Armour vs. the new refor­mu­la­ted Armour to get a break­down of the ingre­dients, and poten­tially give us an idea WHAT is cau­sing thy­roid patients to have a return of their hypothy­roid symp­toms since Forest refor­mu­la­ted Armour in 2009.

Howe­ver, says Sheila, this will cost in the region of £600 to £700 (appro­xi­ma­tely $1100).  Says Sheila, “If there are enough patients who are willing and able to help raise the fun­ding requi­red by giving wha­te­ver we can afford, we could finally get the ans­wer as to which chan­ges have been made in the new for­mula and whether this inc­lu­des chan­ges in the active (as some have sug­ges­ted) and the inac­tive ingre­dients and put this baby to rest once and for all.”

You can con­tact Sheila at the above web­site and make a pledge.  As I write this, they have already have £100 pledged.

UPDATE: Stepha­nie above has agree to be the ‘Pledge and Money Collec­tor’ for the lab work nee­ded to analyze the old vs new Armour . She can be con­tac­ted at ladybugsandbees@sbcglobal.net

If you have been kee­ping up with my posts, you’ll know that thy­roid patients have been facing a shor­tage of desic­ca­ted thy­roid for many weeks, pro­bably due to sharp inc­rea­sed demand i.e. thy­roid patients have been fin­ding out how lousy T4-only treat­ment like Synth­roid has been for them, and how much bet­ter desic­ca­ted thy­roid is.

That demand became espe­cially true after a refor­mu­la­tion of Armour by Forest Labs in 2009 drove patients to RLC’s Natu­reth­roid and Westh­roid. The “new” Armour cau­sed a return of hypo symp­toms plus new mad­de­ning ones, inc­lu­ding pal­pi­ta­tions and sleep pro­blems never seen before.  As Julia Roberts said in the 1990 movie Pretty Woman: Big mis­take, Big, Huge.

In addi­tion, it didn’t help when Time Cap Labs, a phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal which made plenty of desic­ca­ted thy­roid for other phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, stop­ped pro­duc­tion after being con­tac­ted by the FDA. This action was pro­bably in line with their aims to make long-term unap­pro­ved drugs become appro­ved, even if the timing was inc­re­dibly stupid.

As all the above was hap­pe­ning, panic ensued!

We’ve heard all varie­ties of nega­tive pre­sump­tions from thy­roid patients about what cau­sed the shor­tage, inc­lu­ding an FDA cons­pi­racy and an overt belief that desic­ca­ted thy­roid is about to be remo­ved.  Patients have threa­te­ned law suits, bla­med phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, and/or sent nume­rous let­ters to FDA plea­ding to keep desic­ca­ted thy­roid as if it was to be gone tomo­rrow. Even I, at first, fell in line won­de­ring about the FDA.

But it star­ted to dawn on me, as it has others, than we have been jum­ping the gun, not giving enough empha­sis to facts and reason.

And finally, facts and rea­son are star­ting to appear on blogs and groups:

1) Yes, Forest Labs, the makers of Armour, and RLC, the makers of Natu­reth­roid and Westh­roid, state they have not been con­tac­ted by the FDA. We have no rea­son to dis­be­lieve them!

2) Yes, RLC is wor­king hard to catch up, as is Ame­ri­can Labo­ra­to­ries, both state. We also have no rea­son to dis­be­lieve them!

3) Yes, thy­roid patients who know the supe­rio­rity of desic­ca­ted thy­roid have always been there to sup­port them. Glad to see that recog­ni­tion in blog and group postings.

4) Yes, as health wri­ter Mary Sho­mon has sta­ted, information-gathering, brains­tor­ming, and com­mu­ni­ca­ting with our doc­tors is a good thing to be doing.  That is con­trary to making panicky nega­tive pre­dic­tions about desic­ca­ted thy­roid,  rall­ying for law suits, and fee­ding ideas to the FDA that may not be there in the first place.

5) Yes, we need to put energy in let­ting the world know about the supe­rio­rity of desic­ca­ted thy­roid treat­ment in our lives. That is where our power lies in the face of clue­less Endoc­ri­no­lo­gists and their equally-clueless medi­cal boards like AACE.

6) Yes, we need to lis­ten to and sup­port the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals and labo­ra­to­ries which give us the desic­ca­ted thy­roid we need. It’s they who have to walk the line with the FDA. Let’s lis­ten to their cau­tions and sup­port them.

Stran­gely, there are still mis­con­cep­tions being repor­ted by patient blogs and posts:

1) That we don’t know what cau­sed the shor­tage. But we do! Demand is as logi­cal as it gets.  All of us have suc­cee­ded in get­ting the word out! That is exactly why I crea­ted STTM in the first place!  And by emails I get every week, it’s clear that it’s been working.

2) That groups like the Coa­li­tion for Desic­ca­ted Thy­roid (CDT) have a wait-and-see atti­tude. That is as silly as saying STTM wants to ban T4 or encou­ra­ges self-treatment. There are simply some thy­roid patients who don’t agree with the extreme panic and nega­tive pre­sump­tions that have been going on, and want more rea­son in our pro-activity!  Patients have been encou­ra­ged to spread the word in any way pos­si­ble about the supe­rio­rity of desic­ca­ted thy­roid and how it’s chan­ged lives, NOT to feed dire nega­tive pre­dic­tions which only end up giving ideas we don’t want to give! You are most wel­come to join the Coa­li­tion above in addi­tion to other groups.

Good for patients and advo­ca­tes alike for put­ting more rea­son and fact in this situation.

I’m also glad to see some stra­te­gic, pro-active behind-the-scenes work going on as a just-in-case line of acti­vism. That is the way it should have always been – a plan for action “just in case”, not dire pre­dic­tions and fear mon­ge­ring as if it all WAS going to happen.

We’ll get through this, folks. Here are options for thy­roid treat­ment in the mean­time. And if you want to talk to other patients, join our thy­roid patient Com­mu­nity Call this Fri­day. Details are found in the Sep­tem­ber 7^th blog post.

We always talk about phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals who pro­duce our desic­ca­ted thy­roid medi­ca­tion pills like Forest Labs (Armour) and RLC Labs (Natu­reth­roid and Westh­roid). These are also the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals who pro­vide these pills to the local phar­ma­cies we use. But there is another impor­tant link in the chain that pro­ceeds them: Ame­ri­can Labo­ra­to­ries, Inc. (ALI)

ALI is a small pro­ces­sing com­pany loca­ted in Omaha, Nebraska which was esta­blished in 1967 by Mr. Jack Jack­son and Mr. William Pha­len.  They have been making desic­ca­ted Por­cine Thy­roid Pow­der (which is an Active Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal Ingre­dient, API) for over 40 years, as well as 200 natu­ral bio­lo­gi­cally deri­ved pro­ducts such as Panc­rea­tin and Pep­sin, both diges­tive enzy­mes. Their man­tra is “Buil­ding trust through qua­lity pro­ducts and service.”

ALI, as a lea­ding manu­fac­ture and sup­plier of enzyme and natu­ral dried pro­ducts, is also pro­bably the only North Ame­ri­can com­pany to make desic­ca­ted thy­roid pow­der. And they will explain that it’s a long and dif­fi­cult pro­duct to make, but they are com­mit­ted to it.

This mor­ning, I spoke with Kenny Soe­joto, the Chief Ope­ra­ting Offi­cer. He explai­ned that supply and demand has been a cri­ti­cal issue, and ALI will be doing everything they can to pro­vide the qua­lity desic­ca­ted thy­roid pow­der to phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals that they always have. You’ll also see a Press Release come out later today from Kenny and ALI about the issue. I’ll add it below.

The supply and demand issue is outright due to the current patient revo­lu­tion, repre­sen­ted by STTM and other fine groups and web­si­tes,  against the sole treat­ment of hypothy­roi­dism with T4 meds like Synth­roid by too many doctors.…and in favor of desic­ca­ted thy­roid as a far bet­ter treat­ment. Demand has grown, and perhaps it caught them by sur­prise. (That is my com­ment, by the way, NOT ALI’s.)

Even RLC Labs sta­tes that demand for Natu­reth­roid (due to pro­blems with the newly for­mu­la­ted Armour) has qua­dru­pled in the past few weeks. And rightly so!  Thy­roid patients around the world KNOW FIRSTHAND how much bet­ter desic­ca­ted thy­roid treat­ment is over T4-only. And word is spreading.

So as we,  thy­roid patients on desic­ca­ted thy­roid, face a shor­tage the next few months, take heart that ever­yone is wor­king hard to bring supply back to us.  Also see my post below con­cer­ning the big­ger issue with Medco, and poten­tial alternatives.

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Here’s the Press Release below, and it should calm any fears or panic:

August 19, 2009

To our know­ledge, Ame­ri­can Labo­ra­to­ries, Inc. is the only manu­fac­tu­rer in North Ame­rica of Thy­roid Pro­ducts for use in Human Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals as an Active Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal Ingre­dient. We have manu­fac­tu­red our Thy­roid pro­ducts for over forty years, and we unders­tand the impor­tance they have to our cus­to­mers and ulti­ma­tely the con­su­mer patients. Today, as well as in the future, our Thy­roid pro­ducts will con­ti­nue to be a stra­te­gic part of our business.

Through the years, the world-wide demand for our Thy­roid pro­ducts, as well as our human nutri­tio­nal enzyme pro­ducts has inc­rea­sed dra­ma­ti­cally. Through care­ful plan­ning and strict adhe­rence to regu­la­tions set forth by the FDA, USDA and other govern­ment agen­cies, we have imple­men­ted plans to inc­rease our pro­duc­tion capa­ci­ties. In addi­tion, Ame­ri­can Labo­ra­to­ries’ is wor­king clo­sely with our sup­pliers to help ensure a con­sis­tent supply of qua­lity raw mate­rials. We hope that you unders­tand that the pro­cess to manu­fac­ture the active ingre­dient takes seve­ral months to complete.

Please be assu­red that we have pla­ced our Thy­roid pro­duc­tion as our num­ber one prio­rity so that we can meet the demands of our customers.

Ame­ri­can Labo­ra­to­ries, Inc
Omaha, Nebraska, USA

*Want to be infor­med of these blog posts? Curious what’ s on Janie’s mind? Use the Noti­fi­ca­tion on the left below the links.

*Like sales?? I do. And the STTM t-shirts are now 50% off. Spread the word!!

Just when you think we’re full of great infor­ma­tion for bet­ter thy­roid care, there’s still more to learn and find out.  Below is infor­ma­tion that you might find inte­res­ting on STTM.

ADRENALS: For those who dis­co­ve­red via the 24 adre­nal saliva test that they nee­ded cor­ti­sol sup­port, we have come to rea­lize that some can’t do the ram­ping up sche­dule from a small amount to a lar­ger amount without having pro­blems from the feed­back loop.

Ins­tead, many simply need to “start” on the higher amount, which would range from 20 – 30 mg. You can read about that on the How to Treat page, and you’ll note that not one mor­ning amount goes higher than 10 mgs.  With the excep­tion of men, higher than 10 mg seems to sup­press the ACTH and adre­nals too much.

A NEW LOOK: To make the STTM home page more unders­tan­da­ble to new­co­mers, the home page has bro­ken down the infor­ma­tion bet­ter into sepa­rate pages, and also has a new inte­res­ting way of using it.

LISTEN TO THIS INFORMATION: STTM has short audio clips you can lis­ten to, or send someone else to, to help unders­tand what this is all about.

STORIES OF OTHERS: Indi­vi­dual real-life sto­ries con­ti­nue to come in, pro­ving over and over that this revo­lu­tion for far bet­ter care really does work.

FEEDBACK and MORE FEEDBACK: I get emails daily about lives chan­ged thanks to this patient revo­lu­tion. It’s won­der­ful to see peo­ple fin­ding out WHY they have depres­sion, less sta­mina than others, rising cho­les­te­rol and blood pres­sure, hair loss plus other lin­ge­ring symp­toms of  hypothy­roi­dism left untrea­ted because of the lousy TSH, or under­trea­ted because of the equally-lousy T4-only treat­ment like Synth­roid. I can’t begin to post them all, but STTM does con­tain a sam­pling of this feed­back.

DESICCATED THYROID BRANDS: Wow, the list is gro­wing for desic­ca­ted thy­roid brands around the world! We now have lis­tings for Den­mark, Ger­many, Italy and New Zea­land, as well as more detai­led infor­ma­tion on com­poun­ded thy­roid in Aus­tra­lia. Thanks to all who contributed.

KEEPING UP WITH ADDITIONS TO STTM: In case you didn’t know, there’s a page meant to inform you of what’s added to STTM. I may neglect to list a few addi­tions occa­sio­nally, but think I’m pretty close to get­ting most of them up there.

MEDICAL RESEARCH TO PROVE WHAT WE ALREADY KNOW: Did you know that STTM has a page which com­pi­les research and stu­dies which prove what we as patients already know? It’s not loa­ded with research yet, but it’s gro­wing. And if you have found more to con­tri­bute to that page, use the Con­tact Me form.

SITE MAP: And bot­tom line, you can always go to the Site Map, or review the infor­ma­tion more com­pactly in the book, which patients are taking into their doc­tors offices.

*Want to be infor­med of these blog posts? Curious what’s on Janie’s mind? Use the Noti­fi­ca­tions on the left at the bot­tom of the links.

*Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness T-shirts are now 50% off! I like sales, don’t you? And by wea­ring these shirts, you’ll never know what seed you put in the mind of someone wal­king past you who’s still on Synth­roid or any other T4 meds, and doesn’t know WHY they have depres­sion, rising cho­les­te­rol, easy weight gain, the need for naps, etc. You”ll also find humo­rous bum­per stic­kers which defi­ni­tely spread the word.

The follo­wing com­ment by RLC Labs, a phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal which has made desic­ca­ted thy­roid like Natu­reth­roid since the 1930’s, was sent in a let­ter to a phar­macy. You may find it inte­res­ting as com­pa­red to pro­blems so many have repor­ted with Forest Labs and the newly for­mu­la­ted Armour:

We have never had any man­da­tory or volun­tary recall of any of our thy­roid medi­ca­tions due to incon­sis­tency in dosa­ges. Our for­mu­la­tion and pre­pa­ra­tion is able to sta­bi­lize the T3 and T4 hor­mo­nes through its entire expiry period (3 years from manu­fac­tu­ring) pro­vi­ding addi­tio­nal assu­rance to both phy­si­cian and patient alike in qua­lity and con­sis­tency of our strengths.

Kudos for RLC Labs and Natu­reth­roid! Patients whose lives have chan­ged ten-fold thanks to desic­ca­ted thy­roid need a good pro­duct. (And we’re going to hope down the line that “someone” will create desic­ca­ted thy­roid in a sublin­gual form.)

P.S. If you don’t know what has hap­pe­ned to Armour and patient expe­rien­ces with it, scroll down.

*Want to be infor­med of these blog posts? Curious what’s on Janie’s mind? Just use the Noti­fi­ca­tions to the left and below the links.

*SALE! Stop the Thy­roid Mad­ness T-shirts are now 50% off just because I like sales. A great way to spread the word about our patient revo­lu­tion for the supe­rio­rity of desic­ca­ted thy­roid over T4-only meds. You’ll also see funny bum­per stic­kers. Also…when you order the STTM book and request it,  you get a Cal­vin peeing on.…(you’ll see) bum­per stic­ker for FREE, and it’s a hoot.