Thyroid

Collective Health Center serves those who are frustrated with not getting the time or help they needed to feel better and those looking to address the underlying root cause(s) of their health concerns. Our focus is on health restoration, not just treating symptoms. We take time to listen to the whole story, answer questions and educate. Dr. Sarah, as a medically-trained naturopathic doctor seamlessly, combines time honored therapies from naturopathic and East Asian Medicine with modern, conventional approaches.

How do you support people with thyroid disease at Collective Health Center?

When it comes to our health – specifically dealing with issues relating to weight management and fatigue – we must account for our thyroid and the role it plays in our endocrine system. Everything from nutrition to lifestyle choices can have a high impact on our thyroid and can help us to manage any disorders or issues that may occur. Located within our necks, the thyroid plays an important role in how our bodies metabolize nutrients, grow, develop, and process/regulate the hormones that run throughout our bloodstream.

While there are two categories of thyroid issues we see – hypo and hyper – hypothyroidism is more common and therefore I support more patients dealing with this condition. As the name suggests, hypothyroidism is when the body and thyroid are not functioning well enough to be producing and properly balancing the hormones the entire body system needs. The patients that I work with have either subclinical hypothyroidism, autoimmune thyroid disease (ie Hashimoto’s or Graves), and/ or frank hypothyroidism. While most of the patients that I see with thyroid issues are working with another provider, such as their primary care provider or endocrinologist, they support the patients by managing their prescription medications and I support them by considering their underlying nutritional, nutrient, environmental, and underlying chronic health factors that may be affecting their thyroid help to be able to deal with the issue through a natural, holistic approach. I love being able to partner up and work alongside my patients’ conventional care teams to consider their whole person and lifestyle as root factors of imbalances and be able to offer them supporting approaches to what their primary care prescribes. In a lot of cases, this approach can help to restore healthy thyroid functions.

As I mentioned above, a holistic approach is how I take on my patients, and thyroid issues are no different. My favorite way to support the thyroid is by helping my patients support their whole body to function more optimally. I like to dive into how their whole body is constructed, what their levels of different hormones are already like, what their nutritional/dietary habits are, etc. There are so many wonderful supplements to consider such as selenium, glutathione, NAC, and turmeric. However, if the lifestyle is not supportive to good health, then supplements do not do much good. So, I always start there – the foundations of their health. It is truly amazing what simple things such as adequate sleep and hydration can do for the human body! Our thyroids are one of the most sensitive glands in our bodies, it makes sense that when we are disconnected from the natural energies our bodies give off and receive and end up spending our days in boxes continually in front of screens, our bodies start to break down and lose its natural healing factors.

Early diagnosis and exploration of possible modifiable factors are absolutely keys to helping out my patients. When it comes to autoimmune thyroid diseases, I always keep celiac disease and autoimmunity on my radar since they are risk factors for autoimmune thyroid disease. I’ve seen some reversal of autoimmune thyroid disease once a gluten-free diet is initiated in several of my patients. Another issue that I’ve seen reversals in early diagnosed autoimmune thyroid diseases is where nutrient deficiencies were promptly addressed.

One particular treatment plan that I commonly see but am super cautious with when prescribing to my patients – iodine and iodide. Iodine stimulates the thyroid to produce hormones that can also be overstimulating to those already with autoimmune thyroid disorder if the body lacks adequate antioxidants – such as glutathione – to combat the heat or inflammation. Also, conversely, too much iodine can temporarily stun the thyroid from producing those hormones, this is known as the Wolff-Chaikoff effect, which is supposed to resolve after several days of higher dose iodine supplementation. However, in patients already with autoimmune thyroid disease, this effect can sometimes be ongoing and I’ve seen this occur clinically many times for patients. Optimizing antioxidant status in these patients is an essential first step and I have many tools to help patients assess their antioxidant and nutrient levels

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