Natural Doctor / ND / Naturopath / thyroid disease

In My Humble Opinion
1

What is a “natural doctor”? “ND”? Is it the same as a naturopath? I don’t know what that is either.

I have a suspicion that they are some kind of phony-baloney “practitioners” like homeopaths and such. But I would appreciate more solid and complete factual information from anyone who knows about them.

The reason I’m asking is that an acquaintance of mine has started consulting a natural doctor for thyroid problems—possibly/probably Graves disease—the various tests are still in progress.

She is also seeing her primary care physician and an endocrinologist, but has started going to the natural doctor because she is unhappy with the strategies, attitudes, and treatment options offered by the actual doctors.

She hasn’t stopped going to the regular doctors and is still in the process of a long series of tests of various kinds, but the P.C.P. was (understandably, in my mind) unhappy to learn about the natural doctor.

Frankly, given the frustrating way in which the P.C.P. and the endo have approached this situation—half the time it seems like they can’t remember what patient they’re addressing or what has gone on before—I don’t blame her for trying to seek alternatives. But I am a huge skeptic of alternatives that include “alternative medicine.” (Among other things, I take the view that if it were real, it would just be called “medicine.”)

So far the treatment options talked about include:

(1) Various types of drugs, which might take months or years to work, if at all.
(2) Using radioactive iodine to kill the thyroid, which would involve a kind of quarantine from human or animal contact for about a week and then a lifetime of hormone therapy.
(3) Surgery to remove the thyroid, plus a lifetime of hormone therapy.

It seems like the docs want to go with option No. 1 first, but it seems that a very large percentage of people starting with drugs have to go with radioactive iodine or surgery anyway.

Any information or experience with natural doctors or thyroid disease would be welcome.

2

I have a friend who is a DN, although she doesn’t practice for money. Her coursework at Trinity School of Natural Health, and I think the program requirements/classes are at the bottom of this page:

http://http://www.trinityschool.org/program.php?id=1.

It’s a little (or a lot) woo, frankly. My friend focused on the nutrition aspect of it, but lots of other oddball stuff is thrown in there. I wouldn’t necessarily discourage someone from seeing a DN as long as they can afford it, because I’m a very strong believer in the power of placebos, but I also wouldn’t want to let a DN’s treatment plan override an MD’s. (Heh. This may be the nicest opinion of DNs that you get here…)

3

Woo, eh? That’s the direction in which my suspicions lead.

4

One of my good friends is a naturopathic doctor, and she believes a lot of crazy bullshit, like iridology, for example. I really like her as a person and friend, but it’s becoming increasingly hard for me to respect her because of these beliefs that I find borderline-insane, almost. My friend would tell your friend that she wanted this disease on some level, that she drew it to herself, and that almost any form of “real” medicine won’t help her, will hurt her, and that she needs to solve this on an emotional and/or spiritual level.

Maybe not all NDs are like this, but many of her Facebook friends are of her ilk, and they all seem to agree with her bizarre statements.

5

A lifetime of hormone therapy sounds pretty terrible, but for thyroid replacement (hypothyroidism) it’s actually not bad. It might take a little tweaking at the onset to get the right level, but after that it usually stabilizes out and takes very little maintenance. Sort of like taking a vitamin every morning, except you want to make sure you take it about an hour before eating food. Of all the medications to take, it’s probably one of the easiest. It’s actually a lot harder to control the reverse condition, hyperthyroidism (too much thyroid), which is why a lot therapies end up in the hypothyroid category anyway.
Oh, I should also add that due to differences in thyroid medication and production, it’s one of the few medications where it’s best to get the brand name to ensure consistency from refill to refill. Not that the brand name is better, necessarily, just so it stays the same.

6

Naturopathy is not based on any proven body of evidence; it is woefully lacking in any worthwhile studies to show any effectiveness for their practices, and I wouldn’t touch it if my life depended on it.

Naturopaths as a whole tend to be rather critical of vaccination, also.

7

NDs (naturopathic doctors/a.k.a. naturopaths) tend to use a grab-bag of alternative therapies, such as homeopathy, acupuncture and enemas, plus assorted vitamins, supplements and “lifestyle” interventions. A lot of this is aimed at removing nonexistent “toxins” from the body.

If you read up on what naturopaths recommend for people with thyroid problems, you find a lot of references to imagined negative environmental influences and need for vitamins and dietary manipulations. A patient with an overactive thyroid who consults a naturopath might get extraneous and unnecessary tests to look at adrenal and sex hormone function. Overall, expect a great deal of woo under the heading of “treating the whole person, not the disease”. :rolleyes:

At best, the OP’s friend will wind up wasting money on useless ND interventions that are not covered by her health insurance. Or the ND’s treatments could interfere with legitimate therapy. Worst of all would be if the ND convinces her to drop evidence-based medical care and rely on woo.

8

ND = Not a Doctor.

9

This is ***exactly ***how Woo-meisters get their patients – when the patient has a crap MD medical team that the patient feels isn’t paying attention to the patient’s needs and desires.

Well, issue one; if it’s Graves Disease, she needs a proper MD endocrinologist. Graves can do nasty things like set off a chain reaction that can leave one blind if not treated correctly.

So if it were my friend, I would mention that the endocrinologist is her best option because of how science-based medicine is tested and works.

And I’d become her support system, so she doesn’t need a woo-doctor to do that.

I’d also work with her to get her comfortable with asking questions about options and the treatment plan. That is the only way to get the best possible medical care.

Finally – and I really suggest this – Your friend should make a list of all of her questions and concerns and ask for an appointment with the endocrinologist. She can request a “long” appointment when she calls and explain that she has a lot of questions about her new diagnosis. Again, if the doctor tries to leave before answering questions or giving her information, bad sign. If it were me, I would have at least these questions about the treatment schedule, and I’d take notes on the answers.

  1. how long would you work to stabilize medications before you move on to radiation/surgical removal of the thyroid?
  2. do you take side effects into account (thyroid can make you really wacky; this doesn’t work for those of us with jobs…)? How do you treat side effects of the medication when they affect my professional and interpersonal life?
  3. does radiation have a clear clinical benefit over surgical removal of the thyroid? If so, what is it? How do you determine which is right for my condition?
    And if she really dislikes the endocrinologist and the endocrinologist isn’t willing to hear her out, she should ditch him. She is the patient, she gets to choose. She is hiring this person for a very serious condition, and she should get the best she can find.

BTW, I have a friend who’s had no thyroid since she was 7 or 8. She’s been on thyroid pills since then, about 35 years. She’s fine. When she was a kid, her dad (a doctor) put the pills in an empty birth-control-pill dispenser so she’d remember to take them.

10

Thanks for the advice.

I’m not really in a position to tell her what to do or give her detailed advice. I’m just concerned.

From what I have heard from her and know about her, she is very assertive with doctors and does challenge them and insist on having her concerns addressed. I think she’s just often not happy with the answers.

Final course of medical treatment hasn’t yet been determined. Last week she had a nodule frozen, so I guess that’s another delay.

11

Having a bad experience (or knowing of a relative’s bad experience), or feeling that your physician(s) are not spending enough time with you is certainly one way alt med providers acquire patients, but far from the only way.

And there’s a big reason why some people turn to alt med - they’re unhappy with treatment options and someone offers them what looks like an appealing, “natural” way out.

Or they’re inclined towards woo on a political/philosophical/“spiritual” level.

They may be favorably disposed towards conspiracy theories - like the one that claims health care providers want to keep patients sick in order to make money, and thus distrust them.

In some instances they don’t have adequate insurance or finances to pursue mainstream care (though alt med can rack up large bills too).

12

So far the medications and procedures have been exhausting and arduous. So, I understand the frustration. I just hope this natural doctor doesn’t throw a wrench into the works.

13

they rarely, if ever, use anything as substantial as a wrench.

14

and normally far more expensive than your run-of-the-mill wrench.

15

Well, last time we talked, i gingerly brought up the question along the lines of “I’ve been reading about naturopaths. I’m worried that they might not be doing anything effective.”

Got a pretty emphatic discourse in response, including “I’m smart enough not to be fooled (I avoid the ones who push their vitamins),” and “I don’t trust pharmaceutical companies,” and “I’m not going to trade hyperthyroidism for hypothyroidism,” and “doctors have screwed me and my loved ones over before,” and "a naturopath helped my mom, and “I don’t want to spend my life on hormones,” and “these drugs/treatments are pumping poison into my body.”

I don’t think I’m in a position to argue with her and I just have to hope for the best.

16

The first mistake a fool makes when being fooled.

I sympathize with you, Ascenray. Some people are determined to do something dumb, and then you’re left in a position where you either intervene, get ignored and then can’t even help them when the consequences appear, or let them continue on their dangerous path, just hoping they figure it out for themselves before they lose too much.

17

Paraphrasing somewhat, “no wise man has the power to reason away what a fool believes.”

Unless I have a professional duty to do so (like when they’re my patients), I don’t try to change minds.

18

Two views on naturopathic doctors:

Many years ago, I was diagnosed by an MD with low thyroid. He prescribed a synthetic thyroid replacement. My systems persisted, and I was developing considerable inexplicable muscle and joint pain. No help from the MDs that I saw with either problem.

I went to a naturopath recommended by a friend. He changed my thyroid replacement to one made from, I think, pig thyroid. Worked like a charm. He said that some people do better on the real stuff than on the synthetic; for some people, the synethetic is fine. Didn’t/doesn’t sound like woo to me.

In time, he also went on to accurately diagnose and treat my Addison’s Disease, which was the primary cause of my pain (uncontrolled inflammation). There was never any conversation about my emotional, pyschological, spiritual, past life, or karmic condition causing the disease. Before you get all crazy on me, yes, I have had the diagnosis confirmed by an endocrinologist, who argeed completely with my ND’s treatment plan of 5 mg. of prednisone daily.

Fast forward a few years: Another friend says she’s seen a ND that helped her back pain. Maybe she could help me with my arthritis-related back pain? This ND recommended (I kid you not) over $400 worth of supplements and homeopathic tinctures and pills, that they do some sort of electrographic brain mapping with subsequent “rewiring” treatments, and some other weekly-into-eternity treatment that I can’t even recall the name of. I declined.

Point being, someone of them (or at least, one of them) can help. Maybe I just got lucky.

19

I’ve never understood why this is a valid reason to seek out quackery.

Both I and Mrs. J. have experienced what we considered substandard care from one or more MDs. Our reaction to that was not to abandon evidence-based care, but to seek out better and more caring physicians. It wasn’t that hard to find them.

jayrey’s description of the person who reportedly diagnosed his/her endocrine problems doesn’t sound like most naturopaths, who disdain prescription drugs as “treating only symptoms” and “not getting at root causes” (whatever the ND thinks those might be).

Some states let NDs prescribe real medications. I’ll let Mark Crislip speak for me on that subject:

“It is scary to let people trained in magic and premodern concepts of disease to give dangerous drugs.”

20

On my father’s side of the family there are nine cousins. Six of us have had some type of thyroid problems. Even the three who live in California are seeing conventional physicians and undergoing conventional treatment.