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.
There’s an over-the-counter weight loss drug called Alli made by the huge pharmaceutical GlaxoSmithKline. You can see it on the shelves of most any Wal Mart or local drug store. It’s also called Orlistat which is marketed under the trade name of Xenical by the pharmaceutical Roche.
With the recent blog post by health writer Mary Shomon concerning Dr. Sidney Wolfe’s new 4-year term with the FDA’s