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Thyroid Hormone Dosing

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Last Modified: August 14, 2012

Question

In the last 12 months, I have gone from 125 micrograms up to 200 micrograms. Now I take 150 micrograms 4 days per week and 175 micros 3 days. Won't this adversly affect my bones? What is a comfortable dose and how can I tell if I am being "over treated"?

Answer

Kolin Hoff, MD, Endocrinologist at Penn Medicine responds:

Usually if a patient is free of thyroid cancer for several years the TSH can be brought into the low end of normal to mid normal. Regulating the TSH can at time be difficult it is important to be on a steady dose for 6 week between TSH checks and to take the dose regularly and to be sure you are not taking any interfering substances when you take the thyroid hormone like iron, calcium, soy. Sometimes changing brands helps and sometime patients need to be checked for malabsorption.

This question and answer was part of OncoLink's Brown Bag Web Chat Series. View the entire transcript of Focus on Thyroid Cancer.