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Treating Hyperthyroidism: What Are Your Options?


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Summary & Participants

Hyperthyroidism is a serious hormonal imbalance that can lead to weight loss, anxiety, diarrhea and other symptoms. Treatments are available, and in most cases they involve attacking the primary cause of hyperthyroidism, which is a syndrome called Graves' disease. Join our experts as they discuss Graves' disease and the various treatment options.

Medically Reviewed On: July 23, 2008

Webcast Transcript

HOLLY ATKINSON, MD: Hello and welcome to our webcast. I'm Dr. Holly Atkinson. Hyperthyroidism is a serious hormonal imbalance which can lead to weight loss, diarrhea, anxiety and other symptoms. Treatments are available and in most cases, they involve attacking the primary cause of hyperthyroidism, which a syndrome called "Grave's Disease," which affects about 2% of women. One of these women was Gail Devers, track star and Olympic gold medallist. After years of misdiagnosis, she was finally treated and the change it brought on was tremendous. Today, we'll talking about the various treatment options for Graves' Disease, and I have with me today two experts to help me do that. Dr. Melissa Katz from the Weill-Cornell Medical College. Welcome, Melissa.

MELISSA KATZ, MD: Thank you.

HOLLY ATKINSON, MD: And Dr. Rick Haber from the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine. Welcome, Rick.

RICHARD HABER, MD: Thanks.

HOLLY ATKINSON, MD: There are some treatment options for Graves’. It's not just one approach. Melissa, give me the general ways we can approach treating Graves’ Disease.

MELISSA KATZ, MD: There are basically three treatment options, two of which are used much more commonly.

The first one is radioactive iodide, in which a patient will have a drink or a tablet -- depending on the place that they are treated -- of radioiodine designed to decrease the hyperfunctioning of the thyroid gland.

The second possibility is antithyroid drugs. Two of them are commonly used. Named Tapazole and PTU. And these medications are taken for approximately a two-year course and can effect a cure in a percentage of patients that's quite variable. Let's say from 30-50 percent. And the third option is surgery, which is not commonly used, but there are special circumstances in which it might be recommended.

HOLLY ATKINSON, MD: Rick, what are the most common approaches today?

RICHARD HABER, MD: As Melissa said, I think the two most common in the United States are either the antithyroid drugs -- the route of taking medication for a year or two in hopes of inducing a remission of the underlying disease -- or definitively curing the disease by basically getting rid of your thyroid gland, which is what the radioiodine does. And that --

HOLLY ATKINSON, MD: Well, is there a preponderance of which approach is used now?

MELISSA KATZ, MD: In the United --

HOLLY ATKINSON, MD: Drugs versus --

MELISSA KATZ, MD: I think in the United States, radioiodine is most commonly used. Whereas in Europe and Japan, antithyroid medication is more common.

RICHARD HABER, MD: Europeans also like to use surgery, which is something that's become much less popular in the United States. That is, to cut out most of the thyroid rather than destroy it with radioiodine. The end result is the same, it's just a question of preference.

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