Stopping thyroxine
Posted , 7 users are following.
My thyroid has gone from under active to over active . My GP has told me to stop my levothyroxine until my next blood test in 6 weeks time is this ok to do this ?
0 likes, 9 replies
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Notes on Stopping thyroxine
MtViewCatherine linda1958
Posted
Hi Linda, what are your blood levels and dosage? If you're on a high dose, stopping cold turkey could be really rough.
Tutu123 linda1958
Posted
Hi linda
What dose are you currently on? Even on a low dose it's very unusual to be asked to "stop" taking it completely. Usually you would be told to reduce it slightly and retest after 8-12 weeks of doing this and then reducing again if needed.
The key is to make any changes to your medication SLOWLY. Thyroid meds are powerful and you may find that reducing by as little as 25mg at a time may make you feel a bit groggy. When I was reducing my meds i reduced it in 12.5mg increments by using a pill splitter. It let's your body adjust more easily but it will inevitably take longer for you to reach your ideal dose.
The amount you need to reduce by will ultimately depend on your blood test results and symptoms and how far out of the "normal" ranges you are.
Do you have the results for T4 and Tsh? If not, get them and I can try and give you an indication of where you are at if that would help?
Take care
Tutu123
Posted
I should also add - there is a difference between being over-medicated and your thyroid being overactive. I imagine your doctor means you are taking too much medication but still need to take some for your thyroid levels to be ok. Without knowing your history I can only guess but I also know doctors aren't always the best judge of this as they really aren't experts in this area
katz89994 linda1958
Posted
jean65890 linda1958
Posted
Mine too and my sisters just recently last week. My doctor has reduced my thyroxine from 125mg to 100mg my blood TSH was O.15 apparently it should be between 2 and 4. My Doctor did not tell me to stop my medication I'm not saying your doctor is wrong I can only tell you what I've been told to do. My sister was told her medication needed to be reduced from 100mg to 75mg as her results were over and not under. I have to have my bloods done again in ten weeks. I can't imagine what stopping your medication all together will do to your system hope everything goes well for you.
estelle44124 linda1958
Posted
I too have never heard of anyone being asked to stop completely. They reduced my husband's incorrectly: his pituitary gland doesn't produce Thyroxine and the doctor who reduced it was reading TSH level instead of only T 4. His endocrinologist immediately put it back up to 125mg
MtViewCatherine estelle44124
Posted
You can't base the meds on TSH. TSH is what the pituitary is telling the thyroid to do. There are many other factors in the thyroid feedback loop, mostly autoimmune, that cause depletion of T3or T4 elsewhere in the loop. The idea is that your pituitary should still respond appropriately... But my experience was that the TSH was always zeroed out when the T3 and T4 felt best, which was in the high end of normal.
However, although I have very severe thyroid disease, the meds didn't work right in any form, at any dose, and my condition continued to worsen due to the endless and severe side effects of the thyroid medications. In the end, I found it better for me to forego meds and focus on healing the immune system. I'm just pointing out that if you're having side effects, or your TSH is zeroed out for the meds to be effective, you might find the side effects to be worse than the disease.
Tutu123 MtViewCatherine
Posted
I'm so glad you think this too. I only ever feel good when my TSH is really low, then the doctors tell me to reduce my meds and I feel awful again. My t3 and t4 were above range but only slightly. I know this brings risks but would much rather be in slightly too much medication and have some quality of life rather than feeling exhausted and depressed.
MtViewCatherine Tutu123
Posted