Note: The following is the output of a transcription from the video above. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.
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(00:00):
Hashimoto’s and iodine or even thyroid and iodine, I guess we could get into that a little bit. When people come in here, historically, since I’ve been doing thyroid, people come in and they’re taking Thyroxine, and they’re taking selenium, and they’re taking on many, many, many, many were, and still several come in are taking iodine. It’s sorta like traditional in the alternative world to give people this and in the past it probably had more application than it has now. Now it has almost no application as far as taking iodine, but if you have Hashimoto’s, taking iodine is like pouring gasoline on the fire. For all the iodine fans out there, let me explain. The reason that iodine is popular is because if you understand what the components are of thyroid hormone, then you understand that the T stands for Thyroxine in the T4, T4 is the main thyroid hormone that’s made by your thyroid
(01:17):
and T3 is ultimately converted from T4. But the fours and the threes in those little formulas are iodine molecules. It probably made sense at one point in time that if a person had low thyroid, you would give them iodine so that they can make more T4. The problem is, we don’t have a lack of iodine in this country. A lot of people have pointed to third world countries and saying, well, they don’t have enough iodine and people give them iodine and their thyroids get better, but that’s not what the study show. In fact, they’re showing that as they introduce iodized salt into third world countries, that the amount of Hashimoto’s and goiters is skyrocketing. I use that term because I just read something on this past weekend and I read a number of studies on that.
(02:22):
Skyrocketing was the term that was used in that research study. Basically, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis has a uniqueness that you have something called a thyroid peroxidase enzyme. That is the test you run to determine whether a person has Hashimoto’s or not, that thyroid peroxidase enzyme. For those of you know the science I’m vastly simplifying this. The thyroid peroxidase enzyme essentially has a lot to do with pulling iodine out of the system, out of the bloodstream, bringing it into the follicular cells and there’s cells in your thyroid that make the thyroid hormone. Then it puts it together with the thyroxine and it literally is the catalyst to make thyroid. So let me step back to the thyroid peroxidase enzyme is what we measure in order to figure out if a person has Hashimoto’s.
(03:24):
What happens is, if a person has thyroid peroxidase enzymes, these enzymes are what tag the thyroid tissue to tell your immune system to come and attack it. If you increase iodine, then that activates more thyroid peroxidase enzyme, it actually causes your body to make more thyroid peroxidase enzyme. Very simply those anti TPO antibodies, they’re called the thyroid peroxidase enzyme anyway, start attacking your thyroid more because there’s more of them and you end up getting more of an attack. If you have tested positive for thyroid peroxidase enzyme antibodies, iodine is totally contraindicated. You know to go back to, maybe it seems like this thyroid condition, Hashimoto’s really exploded about 30 years ago. And so I can theorize that before that, for some reason, we weren’t getting a lot of autoimmune attacks in our thyroid.
(04:31):
I’m sure people had it, but it was being missed, but I don’t think it was that big. So at that point, it’s entirely possible that people were taking iodine. It was how and they had hypothyroid and it helped me. They didn’t get diagnosed with Hashimoto’s. They took it, they felt better. And it was like, that became the alternative treatment. But today with the advent of iodine, literally being mandated in all the salt, that there is and I tell my patients who have Hashimoto’s, don’t use salt, don’t use table salt, try to avoid it. It’s almost impossible to avoid. If you go out to restaurants, it’s impossible to avoid if you eat processed foods, if it’s the chickens that come from your supermarket, all of this All these things have salt in it that can exacerbate Hashimoto’s. So, if you are a thyroiditis or Hashimoto’s thyroiditis suffer,
(05:26):
you want to prefer like the Himalayan salts, and the pink salts, and the sea salts and stuff like that for that particular reason cause it doesn’t have iodine in it. That’s why you they promote those salts. Iodine is bad for Hashimoto’s. I know there’s going to be people out there. You’re still gonna go, oh, it’s iodine. I took it, I felt better. You may be an outlier. You may be an actual hypothyroid patient, maybe you came from somewhere where they didn’t have iodine in all of their salt and now you’re building it up. But in the end you have a positive thyroid peroxidase antibodies that tell you, you have Hashimoto’s iodine. It is contraindicated for that particular patient.
