Thyroid Patients Stage Social Media Protest Against Current Treatment Guidelines In Endocrinology.

PRLog (Press Release) - Jan. 14, 2013 - Thyroid Patients Stage Social Media Protest Against Current Treatment Guidelines In Endocrinology.

Thyroid patients are protesting current treatment guidelines for the treatment of thyroid disease. The American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists (AACE) and American Thyroid Association (ATA) issued these guidelines in September of 2012.

Thousands of thyroid patients are overwhelming the Facebook pages of the AACE and ATA, and signing the petition initiated by ThyroidChange, an international patient advocacy group. Each patient is demanding that the current guidelines be changed to reflect updated methods of diagnosis and varied treatment options.

Michelle Bickford and Denise Rodriguez, co-founders of ThyroidChange, challenge that current guidelines are keeping too many people unnecessarily sick. “Millions of people have thyroid disease, yet many go undiagnosed,” according to the ThyroidChange team.  “Physicians who rely solely on the TSH test and only one treatment option, Levothyroxine (T4 only), too often leave patients suffering from debilitating symptoms such as chronic pain, relentless fatigue, heart disease, depression, and anxiety,” states ThyroidChange.  Michelle and Denise point out that many doctors are unaware of new blood tests and other treatment options, such as natural desiccated thyroid, synthetic combination hormone replacement and Liothyronine (T3 only). These treatment options can greatly improve quality of life for affected individuals. ThyroidChange goes on to say that, “doctors rely on the treatment guidelines suggested, and choose not to run a full, inexpensive thyroid panel, often leaving thyroid disease undiagnosed. As a result, patients continue to suffer with debilitating symptoms or receive a misdiagnosis.”

ThyroidChange unites patient advocacy groups in an effort to gain better care for thyroid disease patients and to raise awareness of this widespread problem.  ThyroidChange also aims to work with medical associations in order to create a unified standard of care for thyroid patients to increase patient access to effective, modern treatment.

Please help this effort by visiting www.ThyroidChange.org (http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thyroidchang...) to sign the petition and unite for better care.