Long term effects of ATD's

August 8, 2003

Hi everybody,

After months with various endocrinologists I decided to ask my Primary Care

Physician to monitor my blood levels and administer changes to my

medication. The reasons for doing this are 1) I feel that all endo's push

way too hard for RAI 2) If you are trying for remission with the use of

ATD's they try to make you come off them too quickly 3) They do not take

into account how the patient is actually feeling. My regular doctor showed

some hesitation about doing this, but we have come to an agreement that if

anything irregular seems to be happening she will once again refer me to a

specialist. I am quite happy with that. By the way my last endo sent me

hyperT again.

I have one question though, which arose after the discussion with my PCP. We

were discussing the pro's and con's of the use of ATD's against RAI and

surgery. She said that there were no studies on the on the long term effect

of using ATD's, or in other words the long term (not sure what " long term "

is in this case ?? 5yrs? 10 yrs?) effect was unknown. Whilst the use of

hormone medication, when a patient was hypoT after RAI, was known to be

safe. What is the opinion of the board ? Does anyone know of any studies of

the long term effects of ATD's ? Has anyone here suffered from taking ATD's

for long periods of time ? I know the WBC has to be monitored but has anyone

here become ill because of that ? Or liver problems etc ?

I look forward to your replies as I am curious about this. And as I feel so

much more comfortable talking to my regular doctor about this, I would like

to be able to continue the discussion with her.

Thanks,

Katy.

August 8, 2003

Katy,

I've been on ATD's for most of the last 9 years. At maintenance levels a

good deal of the time--which you will achieve rather quickly if monitored

closely and you take your dose (in my opinion) divided into 3 x a day. I

have had no ill effects, nor has my endo pushed in any way for me to

discontinue the ATD's, in fact we've discussed the fact that we're both

comfortable with longer-term use. Granny who posts sometimes, has

been on them for twenty-something years. So there are 2 people to use as

examples.

Terry

>

> Reply-To: graves_support

> Date: Fri, 8 Aug 2003 11:47:32 -0400

> To: " 'graves_support ' " <graves_support >

> Subject: Long term effects of ATD's

>

> Hi everybody,

> After months with various endocrinologists I decided to ask my Primary Care

> Physician to monitor my blood levels and administer changes to my

> medication. The reasons for doing this are 1) I feel that all endo's push

> way too hard for RAI 2) If you are trying for remission with the use of

> ATD's they try to make you come off them too quickly 3) They do not take

> into account how the patient is actually feeling. My regular doctor showed

> some hesitation about doing this, but we have come to an agreement that if

> anything irregular seems to be happening she will once again refer me to a

> specialist. I am quite happy with that. By the way my last endo sent me

> hyperT again.

>

> I have one question though, which arose after the discussion with my PCP. We

> were discussing the pro's and con's of the use of ATD's against RAI and

> surgery. She said that there were no studies on the on the long term effect

> of using ATD's, or in other words the long term (not sure what " long term "

> is in this case ?? 5yrs? 10 yrs?) effect was unknown. Whilst the use of

> hormone medication, when a patient was hypoT after RAI, was known to be

> safe. What is the opinion of the board ? Does anyone know of any studies of

> the long term effects of ATD's ? Has anyone here suffered from taking ATD's

> for long periods of time ? I know the WBC has to be monitored but has anyone

> here become ill because of that ? Or liver problems etc ?

>

> I look forward to your replies as I am curious about this. And as I feel so

> much more comfortable talking to my regular doctor about this, I would like

> to be able to continue the discussion with her.

>

> Thanks,

> Katy.

>

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August 8, 2003