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Month: April 2010

10 reasons many thyroid patients are still frustrated, angry, and sick

 

Screen Shot 2015-06-12 at 1.21.49 PMUpdated in 2015:

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 insufficiency 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. Thinking that falling in the range is optimal:

    If a lab result within those numerical boundaries, which are based on a set of people a laboratory picked to come up with the range, says I’m normal, WHY do I still have issues??

  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 low cortisol or low iron or Lyme or undiagnosed gluten issues, etc, 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 some 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 whatsoever and improvement in our bone density and heart health.

  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 understanding from your doctor that these are ALL side effects of poor thyroid treatment.

  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, or like Denmark, refuses to dispense it.

  10. Reformulations and Big Pharma apathy:

    In 2009, then 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.  RLC also reformulated their Naturethroid to some degree, and though some patients still do well on it, others did not anymore. Erfa made some kind of change in 2014 which they denied, yet certain patients all over the world reported new problems they had never had before. You are left wondering WHAT is going to happen next!!

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.

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. And here’s how to find a potentially better doc. 

 

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Question: What do most doctors & lemon cars have in common?

Answer: Most are duds.

On Monday, I had an enjoyable experience with an exception to the lemon cliche:  I was a guest on Dr. Steven F. Hotze’s radio program Health and Wellness Solutions, broadcast live from Houston, Texas.  You can listen to a recording of our conversation here on the lower right under the heading Dr. Hotze Radio in orange.

The commercials were like flies, zeroing in often and irritatingly. But we managed to briefly mention both Stop the Thyroid Madness as well as the Hotze Health & Wellness Center.

And two things struck me about our friendly chat: first, Hotze mentioned that he started prescribing natural desiccated thyroid in the 1990’s, far ahead of most doctors even today!  If only we knew.  And second, he made a quick mention of how disappointing most doctors are for patients, referring to the STTM page called Give Me A Break. If you haven’t seen it, or it’s been awhile, you will find it both hilarious and completely sad.

And it all made me ponder how in 2010, eight years after I personally found the life changing desiccated thyroid,  there are still so many family practitioners and Endocrinologists keeping thyroid patients sick all over the world, even if they mean well, even if they are good people, even if they do other diagnoses and treatments correctly.

So on one hand, it’s reality that progress is slow. But on the other hand, the thyroid treatment wall of ignorance is slowly tumbling down about better thyroid treatment thanks to patients who read about it and carry that information into their doctors offices.

So perhaps over time, the lemons who practice bad thyroid treatment will become less and less prominent in the name of enlightenment, wisdom and LISTENING to patients.

P.S. And by way, if you are lucky enough to have found one of those docs who prescribe desiccated thyroid, remember that NO doctor is all-knowing. YOU live in your own body, and can have your OWN wisdom and knowledge. So expect the relationship be a partnership. And if you can’t get that partnership, find a better doctor.

Want to read more about natural desiccated thyroid? Go here.   To read my own story, go here.

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I will be a guest on Dr. Hotze’s radio show next Monday around noon, Central time

It appears that the report several days ago by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation about natural desiccated thyroid was a disappointment to one who was interviewed. See the blog post below.

So I am glad to announce that Steven F. Hotze, M.D. and I will be doing a good program that does NOT need a totally misinformed Endocrinologist for the sake of “balance”!

I will be a guest on “Health & Wellness Solutions” radio program of Dr. Hotze on April 12th (NEXT MONDAY) to talk about hypothyroidism. The radio show airs Mon-Fri from 12-1pm CST on 700 AM KSEV-Houston, Texas and on the internet through www.DrHotze.com. Our part will start at 10:15 am Pacific, 11:15 am Mountain, 12:15 pm Central, and 1:15 pm Eastern.

You can also read his Press Release about this upcoming show.  Dr. Hotze runs the Hotze Health & Wellness Center in Houston, Texas–a practice which believes the primary criterion for diagnosis, and for evaluating the effects of treatment, is how a patient feels. 

So mark your calenders, set your cell phone alarms.  IF CANADA BROADCASTING CAN’T GET IT RIGHT, JANIE BOWTHORPE WILL!!!

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Pauline Dakin of CBC Radio in Canada is going to do a report TODAY on desiccated thyroid!

(Monday April 5th Postscript to my blog post below: One of the patients interviewed by this reporter states the following: The report left the impression that we (desiccated thyroid users) are a teeny little group on the fringes of medicine, rather than a ground swell of well researched patients trying to improve our health (and every aspect of our lives) with rational, common sense alternatives. We are still voices crying in the wilderness, and ignored by the mainstream medical professionals. C’est la vie.)

Finally.

After years of near-complete silence by the mass media about the profound 60-year medical scandal of T4-only treatment like Synthroid, as well as lives changed due to natural desiccated thyroid, we have some progress.

A few weeks ago, I was contacted by health reporter Pauline Dakin of CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) Radio. She was preparing a report on thyroid treatment and desiccated thyroid, asking for names of Canadian patients and doctors who might speak of their own experiences. Among others, I got her in touch with Canadian thyroid patient Theresa Roberts, who has reminded me of this report.

And, Pauline Dakin’s report on desiccated thyroid will be presented TODAY, Easter Sunday, on CBC Radio One on “The World This Weekend” at 6:00 pm Eastern Time (5 pm Central, 4 pm Mountain and 3 pm Pacific). It’s a comprehensive 1/2 hour news program that airs nationally on weekend evenings and takes an in-depth look at current issues.

And even if you aren’t in Canada, you can listen to this program on CBC Radio One live at http://www.cbc.ca/worldthisweekend/ , or you can download the podcast (which may require free subscription).

HIGH FIVE to Pauline Dakin and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

The 60-year use of T4-only medications like Synthroid, Levoxyl, Eltroxin and other brands has NOT worked for hundreds of millions worldwide, resulting in each patient’s amount and degree of lingering symptoms of hypothyroidism as well as the added misery of adrenal fatigue.

We have also been bandaided with anti-depressants, statins, pain meds, high blood pressure meds and more, all the while being told by our clueless doctors that we are schizophrenically ‘”normal” because the also-lousy TSH test says so.

Or, like my own mother, we have been subjected to Electric Shock Therapy because of depression caused by T4 meds and their inadequate treatment.  You can read about my mother here.

Stop the Thyroid Madnessâ„¢!

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7 replies