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Things I learned today from my new endocronologist
I learned a couple things I did not know about until today. I saw my new endocronologist after waiting two months. He upped my dose from .015 to .050.
He told me:
If you are going to take thyroid meds (t4) you should take SYNTHROID because if you are taking generic there is a good chance that every time you get it filled it may be a little different or from a different manufacturer.
If you are going from lets say .015 to .050 it is difficult at a small level to over medicate because your thyroid will just back off a little from production to compensate for it.
He wants me to take .050 for five weeks to see if this makes my symptoms go away. If my TSH gets below 2.0 and I still have the symptoms, there is something else causing me problems.
He told me that synthroid is the only drug that is EXACTLY like what is produced in the human body. It doesnt matter if its from the pill or your thyroid, as long as you get it from somewhere.
bruce
He told me:
If you are going to take thyroid meds (t4) you should take SYNTHROID because if you are taking generic there is a good chance that every time you get it filled it may be a little different or from a different manufacturer.
If you are going from lets say .015 to .050 it is difficult at a small level to over medicate because your thyroid will just back off a little from production to compensate for it.
He wants me to take .050 for five weeks to see if this makes my symptoms go away. If my TSH gets below 2.0 and I still have the symptoms, there is something else causing me problems.
He told me that synthroid is the only drug that is EXACTLY like what is produced in the human body. It doesnt matter if its from the pill or your thyroid, as long as you get it from somewhere.
bruce
IN my opinion (please read that twice before continuing) the reason why Doctors tell you to only take synthroid is because it is always the exact thing over and over and over. With generics you run the chance of having a slight difference. My Generic cost me $1.94. The synthroid on my insurance was about $19. I have spent almost $4,000 in deductibles over the last 2 years trying to figure out what is wrong with me before finally getting disagnosed with hashimotos. I will pay an extra $17 a month for the synthroid if it even remotely has a chance of making me feel even the smallest amount of feeling better.
I talked to an good friend pharmacist yesterday after we all had this conversation. He told me that if you want to stick with the generics, that is fine too but you have to make sure that you request the same manufacturer which by law is printed on the bottle.
I talked to an good friend pharmacist yesterday after we all had this conversation. He told me that if you want to stick with the generics, that is fine too but you have to make sure that you request the same manufacturer which by law is printed on the bottle.
Wow, lots of post regarding this. I Just want to say to Bruce that I totally understand wanting to listen to your endo. Its really hard to treat thryoid problems and everyone is different. From my experience all dr's, endos or not seem to have different opinioins, theories or recomendations for treatment. Most patients want to trust that what their dr is telling them is correct (although from experience this is not always true). Having this forum has been helpful for me often when im researching information after me not agreeing with a dr. I dont think any of the dr's or treatments are wrong just different approches that dont work the same for everyone. Sounds like Bruce was just sharing what he learnend from his endo's approach. That approach might not be right for all but may suite some. As the patient I totally understand how confusing and frustrating it all can be. I hope we can all continue to support one another.
COMMUNITY LEADER
I'm with goolarra -- that was well said - I was once a newbie and got "thumped" a time or 2 as well - matter of fact, I still get "thumped" now and then........
I'm one of those that needs both T4 and T3 med and I'm lucky enough to have an endo that will give me both - and yes, he gave me cytomel on my "first" visit, because I took it on myself to find a lab that would test without a doctor's order since my "former" pcp would not test FT3.
I was able to take that lab report (TSH, FT4, FT3) to my first visit with my endo and show him that my FT4 was higher, but FT3 very low range. I'm also lucky that he doesn't place much credence on the TSH because mine was "under" the basement at that time and I was still hypo. He took one look at my FT3 level compared to FT4 and handed me a script for cytomel.
The doctor that diagnosed me told me to "never let anyone give you anything but synthroid" --- synthroid did not make me well; partially because the doctor was basing my dose on TSH and partially because apparently, I don't respond well to synthroid and partially because I wasn't properly converting the T4 med to the usable T3.
My endo told me that there was really no difference between synthroid and generic levo and my pharmacist confirmed that -- I'd have to disagree with all of them because once I started on the generic levo, I felt better even without a dosage increase. Then add the cytomel and things improved immensely.
I'm a firm believer that no 2 people are alike and what works for me might not work for you, but I'll pass along suggestions based on what I've tried.
I've also learned that TSH levels don't cause or alleviate your symptoms -- what causes/alleviates your symptoms is really the level of FT3. For some, TSH "reflects" those levels, but for some of us TSH is useless. My latest TSH was < 0.03, but my FT3 and FT4 levels were perfect and I feel better now than I've felt for years.
I'm currently on levothyroxine (T4) - generic synthroid AND liothyronine (T3) - generic cytomel.
We are all so different that we can't make "blanket" statements. I have Hashimoto's/hypothyroidism, pernicious anemia, low zinc levels, osteopenia, etc but there's no way I can say everyone or even "most" Hashi/hypos have these things. This is what I have and my experience might help you or it might not.........
I'm one of those that needs both T4 and T3 med and I'm lucky enough to have an endo that will give me both - and yes, he gave me cytomel on my "first" visit, because I took it on myself to find a lab that would test without a doctor's order since my "former" pcp would not test FT3.
I was able to take that lab report (TSH, FT4, FT3) to my first visit with my endo and show him that my FT4 was higher, but FT3 very low range. I'm also lucky that he doesn't place much credence on the TSH because mine was "under" the basement at that time and I was still hypo. He took one look at my FT3 level compared to FT4 and handed me a script for cytomel.
The doctor that diagnosed me told me to "never let anyone give you anything but synthroid" --- synthroid did not make me well; partially because the doctor was basing my dose on TSH and partially because apparently, I don't respond well to synthroid and partially because I wasn't properly converting the T4 med to the usable T3.
My endo told me that there was really no difference between synthroid and generic levo and my pharmacist confirmed that -- I'd have to disagree with all of them because once I started on the generic levo, I felt better even without a dosage increase. Then add the cytomel and things improved immensely.
I'm a firm believer that no 2 people are alike and what works for me might not work for you, but I'll pass along suggestions based on what I've tried.
I've also learned that TSH levels don't cause or alleviate your symptoms -- what causes/alleviates your symptoms is really the level of FT3. For some, TSH "reflects" those levels, but for some of us TSH is useless. My latest TSH was < 0.03, but my FT3 and FT4 levels were perfect and I feel better now than I've felt for years.
I'm currently on levothyroxine (T4) - generic synthroid AND liothyronine (T3) - generic cytomel.
We are all so different that we can't make "blanket" statements. I have Hashimoto's/hypothyroidism, pernicious anemia, low zinc levels, osteopenia, etc but there's no way I can say everyone or even "most" Hashi/hypos have these things. This is what I have and my experience might help you or it might not.........
I think that's precisely the point, Bruce...this is supposed to be educational and supportive. Once again, please define "support". Is support yeah-yeahing things we know from experience are questionable? Is it even refraining from commenting unless we agree? That's not my idea of support. That's my idea of totally not caring.
We've all BEEN in your shoes...we were all newbies once. I thought you were no longer the newbie that had to be treated with kid gloves. I got my fair share of sometimes not-so-gentle disagreement when I was starting out. I learned a lot from it. If no one had questioned what I said, I'd still be where I was two years ago.
Cut us some slack, too. We all have our "hot" buttons. We may not say everything as graciously as it might be said. We hear the same complaints over and over mostly generated by incompetant doctors who ignore symptoms, treat based on TSH alone, won't test FT3, won't use T3 meds, and tell their patients it's "no longer thyroid related" and send them home to be miserably undertreated with instructions to "eat less, exercise more, oh, and by the way, how about some anti-depressants?". WE get to a point, where we just say, oh, no, not again.
We're people, too, and all dealing with our own problems, time constraints, etc. Don't be so quick to take offense...do you really think we're here because we're not trying in our all-too-human way to help???
We've all BEEN in your shoes...we were all newbies once. I thought you were no longer the newbie that had to be treated with kid gloves. I got my fair share of sometimes not-so-gentle disagreement when I was starting out. I learned a lot from it. If no one had questioned what I said, I'd still be where I was two years ago.
Cut us some slack, too. We all have our "hot" buttons. We may not say everything as graciously as it might be said. We hear the same complaints over and over mostly generated by incompetant doctors who ignore symptoms, treat based on TSH alone, won't test FT3, won't use T3 meds, and tell their patients it's "no longer thyroid related" and send them home to be miserably undertreated with instructions to "eat less, exercise more, oh, and by the way, how about some anti-depressants?". WE get to a point, where we just say, oh, no, not again.
We're people, too, and all dealing with our own problems, time constraints, etc. Don't be so quick to take offense...do you really think we're here because we're not trying in our all-too-human way to help???
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