BRIQUET'S SYNDROME

[Guest guest]

Hi

Everybody

Guess

what I learned today?

Most of

you are aware that Professor Weetman (past President of the British

Thyroid Association) had a publication in the journals 'Medscape' and 'Clinical

Endocrinology' where he states that those patient's still complaining of

symptoms when they were taking levothyroxine and who's blood results were

within the normal range, were suffering from a " functional somatoform

disorder " - meaning it's all in our head...well...did you know that the

posh name for functional somatoform disorder is Briquet's syndrome (BS) which

is also known as Fat File Syndrome (FFS) ? Well now you do and you can impress

your friends - but if your doctor is refusing you a diagnosis and prescribing

you antidepressants only, have a sneak at your medical notes to see whether

this is mentioned anywhere - and challenge him/her to give you an explanation!

As

Professor Weetman has obviously no idea why we still have all the symptoms and

signs of hypothyroidism when our bloods are within the thyroid reference ranges

and when we are on levothyroxine, I could give him many, many reasons why, but

it is much easier for him to hide behind this label. Is it any wonder we are

having such a hard time of getting our doctors to recognise that we are not

being given the thyroid hormone that will make us well again - or because there

is some other condition that is stopping the thyroid hormone from being

absorbed. Have a look at this explanation of somatoform disorder http://www.healthatoz.com/healthatoz/Atoz/common/standard/transform.jsp?requestURI=/healthatoz/Atoz/ency/somatoform_disorders.jsp

Luv -

Sheila