jon222. That is interesting. Can you give some specific details as to the actual dose levels? KSman does advocate continued use of iodine, just at a lower maintenance does than the initial IR dose. So the two may actually be in agreement. We will need specific numbers to compare.
How does the average person begin taking iodine?
See the following example:
Kathy started taking Iodine under the direction of an Iodine Literate Practitioner. She began by drinking a quarter teaspoon of salt dissolved in
eight ounces of water twice a day for fourteen days before starting with Optimox brand Iodoral tablets. He suggested the Iodoral because it is the most predictable formulation for starting iodine dosing.
Her doctor instructed her to start with one 12.5 mg tablet and take it for two weeks along with the salt water. She was also instructed to take the iodine companion nutrients: 300-600 Mg magnesium 1 tab Optimox ATP Cofactors twice a day 200 mcg selenium (or selenomethionine) 1,000 mg Vitamin C 3 times per day ĆĀ½ teaspoon of salt per day with food Additional ĆĀ¼ teaspoon of salt twice per day in eight oz. water.
After two weeks, he asked her if she felt any reactions. She didnĆ¢??t, so he raised the dosage to two 12.5 mg tablets for a total of 25 mg. After another two weeks, she was instructed to raise the dose again and only report back if she had side effects. If she didnĆ¢??t, she was instructed to raise the Iodoral to four tablets for a total of 50 mg. At this point, Kathy began to get brain fog and a headache. Her doctor told her she could take the salt water twice a day but stop taking all Iodoral on weekends to flush out toxins the iodine may have dislodged. Breast Cancer ChoicesĆ¢?? Ć¢??pulse-dosing strategyĆ¢?? caused all side effects to go away. She is now able to take 50 mg Iodoral every day but she skips one weekend every once in a while as per her doctorĆ¢??s instructions.
Farrow, Lynne (2013-04-01). The Iodine Crisis: What You Donāt Know About Iodine Can Wreck Your Life (p. 65). Devon Press. Kindle Edition.
The book mentions nothing about maintenance doses. From the stories and what is says you basically take it for ever. It does not
Many disagree with that open ended high dosing. I consider it very wrong to place that in this sticky because someone may read what you posted and run with it. Please reconsider and edit the above.
Iodine induced hashi as i said all alongā¦
Selenium seems to be quite important. KSman has advocated taking Selenium from a multivitamin. But is that a sufficient amount of Selenium, considering the large amount of iodine?
Not so simple: āIodine induced hashi as i said all alongā¦ā
I am reading a book where it is stated that selenium-enzyme activity is vital to prevent a build up of damage from the byproducts of normal iodineā>T4 activity. When iodized salt was introduced to populations and hashimotoās results *, it is probably the lack of selenium what was the root cause. Not as simple as iw would like to believe.
- It was observed that the introduction of iodized salt in some populations produced an increase in the incidence of thyroid auto-immune diseases. So iodized salt was responsible and any similar increase in iodine intake would have caused this. But the selenium connection was not known at the time. Now the real reason is known and it will take forever for this to be widely appreciated as the internet and publications do not forget.
ksman is narrow mindedā¦ reads a book and decides its lawā¦ do your own researchā¦ high dose loading even with selenium landed my friends and i in the emergency room with his throat closing up and heart plaps. many of you with low T may have underlying Asymptomatic chronic infection (lyme disease, mold illness, heavy metals, autoimmune, bartonella, babesia ect)ā¦ people should try and find the underlying cause.
I have no problem with iodine being used under the care of a qualified practitioner in the right circumstanceā¦ what is described in this forum is dangerous and could cause serious problems or make things worseā¦ when you really need an answer and you are in trouble ksman wont be there to save your azzā¦ please look for a root cause and do your own researchā¦ most of all BECAREFULā¦ it is that simple and ive been telling you to stop telling everyone under the sun to jump on iodineā¦ iodine is not the only thing that causes low body tempsā¦
IW does not want a forum where people discuss iodine deficiencies or iodine replenishment. He wants doctors do deal with this. But we have not had a single guy here tell us that his doctor asked about iodine or suggested that he get more iodine, with or without selenium.
These issues are here mostly because doctors do not address these issues and they are ignorant about how useless the lab normal ranges. Doctors end up treating iodine deficiencies, or the aftermath, with a life time of Rx thyroid medications. I offer the opportunity to recognize and resolve simple iodine deficiency.
Why do I get shit from IW all of the time for taking the time to read thyroid books. IW can do the same and start his own thread then I can go there and poke him in the eye.
We need to do more here than be T centric. Guys come here with T tunnel vision and we need to look for issues that contribute to their low T condition. We also get guys here who have reasonable T levels or on TRT that feel crappy because of thyroid issues that their doctors are blind to. Hypothyroidism and hypogonadism have many symptoms in common and in some cases, one causes or contributes to the other.
Doctors, by their [In]actions, are irresponsible/incompetent for not dealing with these issues, we are the last resort for many of these guys. If it was otherwise, I certainly could find better interests to occupy my day.
IW and his friend had a bad experience with a bottle of an iodine product that he purchased. They had problems which no one else has described here. I see two guys having unusual issues from the same bottle of product and the simple explanation is that there was something wrong with that product, not the concept of resolving iodine deficiencies. I have not seen IW offer an alternate strategy, only sniping attacks.
We have thread here where guys restore body temperatures and also resolve fatigue and other problems by taking iodine. But IW does not seem to be motivated to contribute to getting such outcomes.
IW, please state your solution to iodine deficiency detection and resolution that addresses the issues which also includes the fact that doctors do not take any interest in this. Provide an alternative to the things that you object to.
Make specific recommendations an subsequent steps if taking the iodine replenishment that you recommend does not resolve body temperatures. State how much time you will spend working with individual guys to uncover these issues, recommend and review labs and follow up on these cases.
Added to the first post in this thread:
If you want to know more than basics, see this: http://www.altmedrev.com/publications/13/2/116.pdf
In the above the reasons why selenium is vital are shown.
IMPORTANT: You must have selenium in your diet or vitamins to prevent possible auto immune thyroid damage
Hi guys,
I wanted also to try out some iodine supplementation. For instance one could use kelp (a type of sea weed that has a lot of iodine)
but I found out that some people had serious problems:
From there there are couple of more reports.
What do you think about that and would you recommend kelp (and what dosage) as a iodine supplement.
That person had hypERthyroidism that probably resulted from long term iodine deficiency. The nodules were making T4 independent of TSH levels. Thyroid hormone levels might have been held in check by iodine deficiency and when adequate levels of iodine were introduced thyroid hormone levels went to high. That event is common in with hypERthyroidism and people end up in the emergency ward without an introduction of iodine.
That personās thyroid nodules were there before the kelp tea.
The authors also state: āIodine-induced thyrotoxicosis after consumption of kelp or kelp-containing dietary supplements is rare, as reflected by the small number of case reports that have been documented.ā
KSman what would you say about kelp vs pill iodine supplementation?
The problem could be that you are not always sure the iodine content of kelp that you are receiving.
Supposedly kelp is better because it releases iodine more slowly. but who knows that could be just marketing
I donāt know that those fine points really make any difference. But, when doing high dose IR, kelp is impractical. For slow IR, would be OK. You have to keep in mind that 1mg iodine per day from kelp may take a year or two if one was ID looking at 750mg.
Also another study about iodine intake
doesnt look too kindly on iodine intake when you have autoimmune disease
So someone who has nodules that produce thyroid hormones independent of TSH are hyper but lack of iodine masked their symptoms, when iodine is introduced, the nodules make more thyroid hormones and now the hyper problem shows up in lab work. That is basic. The nodules were a result of iodine deficiency. So the message is that iodine is bad when the root cause was iodine deficiency? The paper is ignorant of the role of selenium that that has great bearing on thyroid autoimmune disease. So its points lack merit.
You really are digging deep! 
Sorry KSMan didnāt mean to offend. I just wanted to explore all options. I see that you are a good expert in this field.
For instance my case is that f3, f4 are somewhat low and tsh is somewhat high (over 2).
In all the papers that i read i never saw that iodine could elevate f3 and f4 and lower tsh
for instance
So is iodine supplementation good for me (and for guys with my stats)? Did you check your ft3,ft4,t3,t4,tsh stats before and after iodine supplementation? And if so what were the stats?
Do you think this could help me (us) or is iodine for other people?
Or do you have a paper that proves otherwise? Beucase in my case i guess its nots good to further elevate tsh and lower t3 and t4 (and from what i see many people here have the same problem - high tsh, low t3 and t4)
Lack of iodine can cause your numbers and IR can improve things.
I did not do IR numbers before my IR as I thought that there was little value in the numbers as I was going to do the IR in any case.
You are looking at descriptions of some well known transient effects. You need to be looking at things after iodine levels are fixed [long view].
In my case, I started to feel better in a few days and I did not need labs to tell me that something good was happening.
If you have been iodine deficient, then the alternative to IR is doing nothing.
Hello,
I just got Iodoral via mail (180 capsules, 12.5 mg per cap). How much selenium do I need to take to offset the self destructive effects of Iodine in excess? Also, is there a significant risk that I can ruin my thyroid by doing this (there has been some discussion about the risks of it)?
For clarification,
my TSH is 3.90 (0.50-4.30 mu/L)
fT4 1.1 (range being 0.9-1.4)
fT3 3.5 (range is 2.9-4.6)
The amount of selenium in vitamins that list it is probably adequate. Or eat Brazil nut - Wikipedia
It is not the iodine that causes the harm, its lack of selenium that is needed in reactions to manage the natural chemical co-products created when during thyroid hormone production. If one has had iodine deficiency and selenium deficiency, restoring natural production rates of thyroid hormones could create problems where the immune system sees inflammation and interprets the damaged thyroid tissues as foreign. Because we can identify a selenium deficiency as a cause of thyroid autoimmune disorders, we should ensure that selenium is available. This applies to anyone in any circumstance. In these forums, we seek to avoid cases where IR used to tread ID becomes associated with a thyroid autoimmune event. Call that covering oneās ass or prudent, same outcome.
[quote]KSman wrote:
The amount of selenium in vitamins that list it is probably adequate. Or eat Brazil nut - Wikipedia
It is not the iodine that causes the harm, its lack of selenium that is needed in reactions to manage the natural chemical co-products created when during thyroid hormone production. If one has had iodine deficiency and selenium deficiency, restoring natural production rates of thyroid hormones could create problems where the immune system sees inflammation and interprets the damaged thyroid tissues as foreign. Because we can identify a selenium deficiency as a cause of thyroid autoimmune disorders, we should ensure that selenium is available. This applies to anyone in any circumstance. In these forums, we seek to avoid cases where IR used to tread ID becomes associated with a thyroid autoimmune event. Call that covering oneās ass or prudent, same outcome.
[/quote]
Thatās interesting. I have a feeling the case studies where people were eating exorbitant amount of Iodine, and had their TSH shoot up really high (like a jump from 3 to 80) was because of the lack of selenium.
And just on an off topic note, @KSman, do you know how hypothyroidism affects muscle protein synthesis? Does it have a noticeable effect on a person who otherwise has normal androgens? Iām just wondering because Iām a powerlifter and was curious if my condition would set me back in the long term.