What is Wilson's
Thyroid Syndrome?
Classically, people with
Wilson's Temperature Syndrome get symptoms that tend to:
- Come
on or worsen under periods of severe physical or emotional stress.
- Persist
even after the stress has passed.
- Can get worse in stages
with each subsequent stress.
In
addition, there are people who seem much more prone to developing
WTS. Their symptoms tend to:
- Come on earlier in
life. So early that some patients may not even know what it feels
like to be normal.
- Worsen more gradually
over time.
Those who seem most prone
to developing Wilson's Temperature Syndrome are those whose ancestors
survived famine, such as Irish, Scot, Welsh, American Indian, Russian,
etc.. Most susceptible of all seem to be those who are part Irish,
and part American Indian. But under severe circumstances people
of any nationality can develop Wilson's Temperature Syndrome.
About
80% of Wilson's Temperature Syndrome sufferers are women.
For a list of symptoms,
please see sidebar to the right.
Wilson's
Thyroid Syndrome is a Reversible Thyroid Problem
There's
treatable and then there's reversible, or "curable." A
condition is treatable when a treatment is able to control the symptoms
as long as the patients continue the treatment. A condition is reversible
when the symptoms remain improved even after the treatment's been
discontinued. The prevailing thinking is that if people have a low
thyroid problem then they must take thyroid medicine for life. However,
taking a medicine for life is not really a cure. Proper treatment
of WTS appears to reset people's thyroid systems so that they can
function well on their own again. There are probably far more people
with WTS than all other low thyroid problems combined. And, Wilson's
Thyroid Syndrome appears to be the only one that is reversible.
In a similar
way, it is true that many difficult-to-diagnosis, difficult-to-treat
chronic conditions have symptoms in common with WTS. And patients
who have these symptoms may not be suffering from WTS but it would
be fortunate if they were because then their symptoms may be easily
reversible.
A
Typical Story of Wilson's Temperature Syndrome
A person is going along
fine in her life and then goes through some major stress and is
never the same. The person goes through a stress like childbirth
or divorce and develops many of the symptoms of WTS. Unfortunately,
the symptoms can persist even after the stress has passed and the
problem is undiagnosable with thyroid blood tests. The symptoms
are classic for a thyroid problem so the patient's doctor checks
the thyroid gland with blood tests. But since thyroid blood tests
only pick up thyroid problems that are diagnosable with thyroid
blood tests, the patient's Wilson's Temperature Syndrome remains undetected.
Then the person finds
out about Wilson's Temperature Syndrome. Her and her doctor agree that
it makes sense and that it's worth a try. She recovers within a
few months and remains improved even after the medicine has been
discontinued.
So even though she had
been told, "Your
thyroid tests are normal so you can't possibly have a thyroid problem,"
her quick recovery with proper T3 therapy suggests that she had
been suffering from WTS, which appears to be the most common and
reversible of all thyroid problems.
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