Three out of four people with an underactive thyroid using an alternative “natural” treatment not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration report that they do so because it is more effective than the standard therapy, according to research from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) and the Mayo Clinic.
Freddy J.K. Toloza, MD, and Spyridoula Maraka, MD, presented their findings in a supplemental issue of the Journal of the Endocrine Society.
“Among people with hypothyroidism, some may prefer alternative treatments over standard thyroid hormone replacement therapies for many reasons, including better perceived effectiveness, improvement in symptoms such as fatigue and weight gain, and improvement in overall wellbeing,” Toloza said.
Toloza is a postdoctoral researcher and Maraka is an assistant professor, both in the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism in the Department of Internal Medicine, UAMS College of Medicine. Maraka is also a staff physician at the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System. Both are also research collaborators at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.
They conducted this study using comments from online patient forums, where they found that people who chose desiccated thyroid extract (DTE) said this option was more effective than other thyroid hormone medications. Comments on DTE use most frequently mentioned an improvement in symptoms and overall well-being as benefits.
This alternative treatment — also known as nature thyroid, thyroid USP, or Armour thyroid — is made from dehydrated pig thyroid glands. An estimated 10%-25% of people with hypothyroidism — an underactive thyroid — use this treatment.
They noted that nearly half (45%) of people who commented about using DTE reported that a health care provider initially drove their interest in trying DTE, even though it is not an approved treatment.
Hypothyroidism affects 0.5%-2% of the U.S. population. Levothyroxine (LT4), a synthetic thyroid hormone, is the recommended treatment for patients with hypothyroidism.
These researchers analyzed the online forums in order to better understand patient preferences and attitudes. They used the 10 most popular patient forums and selected 673 posts for analysis.
Patients described many reasons for switching from a previous thyroid treatment to DTE, including lack of improvement in symptoms (58%) and the development of side effects (22%). Among a majority of patients, DTE was described as moderately-to-majorly effective overall (81%) and more effective than other thyroid hormone medications (77%). The most frequently described benefits associated with DTE use were an improvement in symptoms such as fatigue and weight gain (56%), as well as a change in overall well-being (34%). One-fifth of people also described side effects related to the use of DTE.
“The findings underscore the need for clinicians to individualize therapy approaches for hypothyroidism,” Toloza said.