The number one cause of primary hypothyroidism in the United States is a condition called Hashimoto's Thyroiditis.
Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis is an autoimmune thyroid condition. To understand autoimmune, you first need to understand the immune system. The immune system is the body’s defense system. Eighty percent of the immune system lives in the gut.
To illustrate how a properly functioning immune system works, let’s say you go to a party and someone at that party is sick. You are exposed to a bacteria or virus. If your immune system is strong, you’ll fight the bacteria or virus, you’ll win the fight, and you won’t end up sick.
Now let’s say it’s holiday time - you’ve been busy, stress is high, maybe your diet hasn’t been great and you’ve been eating a few too many desserts. Sugar suppresses the immune system; you’re exposed to that same bacteria or virus at the party, your immune system fights it and loses the fight, and you end up sick.
Both of these are examples of a normally functioning immune system.
In an autoimmune situation, the immune system is no longer functioning properly...
...and it’s not even attacking the bacteria or virus anymore. Instead, it’s turned on your own body and is literally attacking and destroying (in the case of Hashimoto’s) thyroid tissue.
The reason Hashimoto’s patients are in a low thyroid situation is because there’s less thyroid tissue than what’s needed to meet the hormonal demand. The standard of care for low thyroid function in the United State is to put the patient on thyroid hormones, regardless of the cause.
A patient who is only given thyroid hormones and has Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis is literally being ignored, because they’re treating the wrong thing. Thyroid hormones do nothing for the cause of the problem, which is the immune system.
This explains why a patient that has Hashitmoto’s may get a little bit better initially after starting thyroid hormones...
...because you’re giving them a boost; but the cause is not being treated, and the symptoms come right back. As the symptoms come back, they are prescribed a higher dose of medication, and the cycle continues to repeat.
At Premier Health Care, we treat the causes of your illness. We do comprehensive testing to uncover the cause of your illness, and create a diet and treatment plan customized to each individual.
Patients who have been sick and tired for years get their lives back; they lose 30-50 pounds on average; they go off many or all of their medications; they have energy to do things they never thought they’d do again.
If you’re interested in learning more about how we treat thyroid conditions, download my free Natural Approach Series here.
To see if you qualify to become a patient, give us a call at 314-647-1384.