Whoever told you this, Nadine, was not talking about the general experience of the Graves’ patient. I supposed it’s technically possible that some patient, somewhere, was only on ATDs a very short period of time, but I would need more info than that to hold out hope to someone else that they might experience the same thing. For one thing, it would be extremely rare for it to happen. Secondly, you’d need to know that the person had GRAVES and not some other cause for their hyperthyroidism. There is one cause of hyperthyroidism, for instance, that is caused by an infection. It’s like tonsillitis, only it affects the thyroid. In the cause of this disease, called thyroiditis, the body’s immune system FIGHTS the disease, eventually getting rid of it. People who have thyroiditis might have to go onto ATDs for a while (to protect their body from the effects of too much thyroid hormone), but eventually they get completely well again. So, that person might only be on the ATDs for a couple of months. But for those of us with Graves, it is much more the rule that we have to stay on the ATDs a couple of years or longer before our doctors might see signs of remission occurring.
Bobbi — NGDF Asst. Online Facilitator
Bobbi@ngdf.org
