Many substances and health factors can, independently of thyroid hormones, lower TSH secretion significantly. These factors are not listed in Braverman & Cooper’s chapter on thyrotoxicosis in Werner & Ingbar’s The Thyroid textbook, 10th edition 2013, because their chapter avoids defining the syndrome by a low TSH. Nevertheless, these TSH-lowering factors should always be mentioned along with “thyrotoxicosis” in the context of today’s TSH-worship. Whenever doctors see low TSH lab results with normal thyroid hormones, they may presume it’s subclinical thyrotoxicosis and that they must do something about it. Essentially, these are temporary and variable factors that induce “acquired central …
Category: Research Reviews
The impact of thyroid hormone dysfunction on ischemic heart disease, and how T3 therapy may help
Finally! In the past, the overemphasis on hyperthyroidism and thyrotoxicosis and heart diseases has made many doctors think that only excess T3 and T4 is bad for the heart. We finally have an article that focuses on the real cause-effect relationships on the opposite end of the thyroid dysfunction spectrum: HYPOthyroidism. This May 2019 article co-authored by three women and two men from Portugal emphasizes the research on hypothyroidism, especially T3 deficiency, and its adverse effects on ischemic heart disease. In the past, I’ve written a prior campaign blog article about thyroid hormones and the cardiovascular system, but none of …
Question Pilo’s Study: Thyroid Hormone Reductionism
Many aspects of biology are incredibly complex. People love simplicity. It’s necessary for a model to reduce a system down to its basic principles and proportions. Pilo’s research study published in 1990 is now cited as the definitive proof of where human beings’ T3 thyroid hormone supply comes from. Pilo’s paper is what many people point to when they say that “the” thyroid secretes T4 and T3 at a molar ratio of 14:1. Pilo is often who they cite when they claim that 20% of our T3 comes from the thyroid gland, and 80% of our T3 comes from peripheral …
Question Pilo’s study: The wide range of thyroid hormone adaptation
Doctors today are taught that “the” thyroid secretes T4 and T3 at a ratio of 14:1, or 15:1, and “the” human body converts 80% of its T3 supply from T4. These ratios are now taught and passed on as if they are static, immutable laws of nature, like the law of gravity. However, studies of complex thyroid hormone kinetics are based on small populations, like Pilo’s study of 14 people. The 14 people in Pilo’s 1990 study were diverse. They provided a range of T4 and T3 values and ratios. This group of 14 people was also unique. They can’t …
Question Pilo’s study: Iodine dosing biases T4:T3 secretion
This post continues my series that examines two ratios T4:T3 thyroid hormone secreted by “the” thyroid gland. The single origin of both these ratios is an article by Pilo et al published in 1990. A simple summary: In Pilo’s’ study, the huge doses of iodine these 14 people were given every day during the 8-day study could have compromised the amount and ratio of T3 and T4 they secreted from their thyroid glands. The ratio and level could have also shifted over the first few days of the study. These are not natural conditions for thyroid secretion. The findings …