Guest guest Posted October 31, 2004 Report Share Posted October 31, 2004 If you are lucky, you will come out of surgery " not " hypothyroid. It seems for the majority of people, surgery and RAI both kill too much thyroid and make the patient hypothyroid. The trouble with this is that the person ends up with a period of adjustment that can last a long time and if the doctor does not prescribe enough thyroid replacement then the patient has a downhill slide from then on. Doctors today tend not to prescribe enough hormone for many patients to feel well. They also almost exclusively prescribe only synthroid, levoxyl or some other all T4 med, which many people find does not eliminate all their hypothyroid symptoms. In Graves hyperthyroidism, the body produces antibodies against the thyroid that mimmic TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) from the pituitary. This erroniously tells the thyroid to make hormone, when it doesn't need to. The drugs used to slow it down often make the patient hypothyroid to some extent and so this is not a great solution either. However, in the past some of the more enlightened doctors have added thyroid hormone back with the thyroid inhibiting drugs. This has been very successful, but fell out of favor on principal of some doctors not liking to give thyroid to hyperthyroid patients. However doing this is not harmful at all and may be helpful. By giving thyroid hormone with the anti-thyroid drugs, you slow your own thyroid function and this slows anti-body production. In fact, in some people, suppressing thyroid function with enough of high doses of thyroid hormone can calm the thyroid and reduce the TSH mimicking antibody production. Suppressing the thyroid with high doses of thyroid hormone can be an option to treat this condition. There are some possible benifits to waiting as long as you can before resorting to irreversible measures such as surgery or RAI. In Graves hyperthyroidism left untreated with RAI or surgery, the thyroid will eventually become damaged from antibody attack and it will slow down. Eventually, you will become hypothyroid. This can take many years. The condition can go into remission or calm down significantly on it's own. My mother's went into remission after she had a short treatment of 1 year with anti-thyroid drugs and she was fine for 20 years after that. She then finally became hypothyroid and needed thyroid replacement at age 60. A problem with removing part of the thyroid or destroying part or all of it with RAI is that you have little of your thyroid left. This can hamper your life a little. The thyroid stores about a month's worth of hormone. For those who have thyroids and who need replacement, their own thyroids continue to supply most of their body's thyroid hormone requirements. The thyroid makes about 4-1/5 to 5 grains of Armour equivelent a day and typical thyroid hormone replacement doses today are less than 3 grains. So, your thyroid needs to supply the remainder. When you are under stress,you need extra thyroid hormone. So, the more thyroid function you can keep the better, because it can supply the extra you need. But, if you have very little capacity left in your thyroid and you have stress, illness, or extra activity, you are going to run short and may suffer with fatigue and other symptoms. This forces the adrenals to have to work very hard to try and compensate for declining thyroid levels. You can become a bit limited in your life and in how much stress you can tolerate when you have little functioning thyroid gland left. Regular people seem to take their resiliance so for granted, but you can end up with brackets around your life and limits on how much you can push yourself. People who have had their thyroid glands removed have to work the hardest to keep stress reigned in or managed. There are several ways to slow thyroid function safely, also. These include cabbage juice, Alpha Lipoic acid, the addition of adrenal support in the form of low dose hydrocortisone, eating lots of soy products, raw cruciferous vegetables and nuts. A person could concievably treat hyperthyroidism with daily cabbage juice. Cabbage juce and the others listed above are goitergens and slow thyroid function. Tish Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted October 31, 2004 Report Share Posted October 31, 2004 All right, thanks - some questions for the doctor on Tuesday. Are there any stats anywhere on the success of the various treatments? The GP said that surgery would be necessary because of the nodules on my thyroid... so far, the RAI hasn't been mentioned. Ontario > > If you are lucky, you will come out of surgery " not " hypothyroid. It > seems for the majority of people, surgery and RAI both kill too much > thyroid and make the patient hypothyroid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted November 2, 2004 Report Share Posted November 2, 2004 Here is one study on partial thyroidectomy outcomes for you: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi? cmd=Retrieve & db=PubMed & list_uids=12206601 & dopt=Abstract Tish Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted January 30, 2007 Report Share Posted January 30, 2007 Hi, just to share something about candida. I have recently started treatment with homeopatic and herbal remedies for it + strict diet. And it seems the best option so far. Antifungal antibiotics just helped me with symptoms, but only managed them for a short time. I am on magnesium as well. Have not found any connection to candida overgrowth. I get candida infection (in my digestive track)usually when I am burnt out, overtired, after antibitic or sometimes other treatment. When I tried to decrease effexor it got me as well. ikam Withdrawal_and_Recovery , " mainlyfatigue1 " wrote: > > thank you , that is a relief. i guess i should have looked > more closely at the finer details! > > > > > > > hello all i am another new member. Like Naomi drugs (paroxetine) > made > > things so much worse. i was given 6 months 9 years ago after 10 mins > > with a psych and actually having an undiagnosed physical illness- my > > only symptom resembling depression was fatigue. since then i have > had > > chronic twitches of my head and persistent facial muscular tension. > > both very demoralising. until i saw sites like this i thought there > was > > nothing to be done. however, i recently tried 400iu of natural > vitamin > > e and after 2 days felt more like my old self than i had in 9 > years. it > > did make me feel a bit hot and chesty though. unfortunately the > > physical illness chronic prostatitis persists and the vit e caused > some > > burning pain peeing. i have read lots of good stuff about magnesium > but > > have a concern about it causing candida overgrowth as per > Eby's > > website. with the prostate thing i have to take long courses of > > antibiotics at times, and candida would be most unwelcome! i wonder > if > > anyone has experienced or heard of problems with magnesium causing > > yeast probs. many thanks for listening. > > > > Omer>> > > > > > > > > ** Magnesium does not cause candida. It helps candida. If > yours worsens with magnesium, look at the additives in the magnesium > and instead, get pure magnesium by Gillham at www.vitacost.com > > > > > > Here is what Eby says. If you read it carefully, you'll see it > is nothing but pure conjecture. He is very careful to state this. > Note the phrases " I believe " and " my intuition only, no facts here " . > > > > I disagree with him on his conclusions. There are many > examples of magnesium helping candida. If a malabsorption problem > exists, it is usually much more complicated than Eby presents. The > malabsorption problem itself feeds the candida, not the magnesium. > > > > > > Eby says: > > > > " Some people can't absorb ionizable magnesium compounds since > they have intestinal problems, such as candida albicans infection and > other problems perhaps of a medical nature, and they develop diarrhea > with relatively small doses of ionizable magnesium like magnesium > chloride, citrate, lactate, glycinate and so on. I believe they can't > absorb ionizable magnesium since ionizable magnesium first feeds > candida albicans fungus or other infective agent in the guts, thus > worsening intestinal health and diminishing absorption. I don't know > if this condition is rare or common, but suspect it is rare in well > people but more common in sick people such as depressives. Perhaps > leaky gut syndrome is present. There are fascinating tidbits of > information that suggests magnesium oxide will not be absorbed by > candida albicans (my intuition only - no facts here), yet the human > gut absorbs it. " > > > > -- > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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