Armour vs Natural Desiccated thyroid

[Wen]

Armour is natural desiccated thyroid and it's prescription only but I noticed there are supplements you can buy from anywhere and without prescription that are also 'natural desiccated thyroid'. So what's the difference?

 

[Pablo Cruise]

Armour Thyroid is desiccated thyroid from animals. It is considered slightly more consistent in potency than other desiccated thyroid products. The others may vary in potency because the Armour is a so called name brand. It is best to stick to one brand and if me I would use Armour as long as I could afford. Remember desiccated thyroid is t3 and t4 whereas L- thyroxine is purified t3. I believe after many years........that some people fair better with desiccated form but many are fine on t3.

 

[mostlylurking]

Armour is a brand name for a pharmaceutical grade natural desiccated thyroid. The original Armour company hasn't owned it for years. It has changed hands several times. I don't trust them. They changed their formula in 2014 and it nearly finished me off. I happily took Armour brand thyroid for about 15 years before they pulled this stunt. I use Acella brand natural desiccated thyroid now. link to company website: Acella Pharmaceuticals, LLC – A Specialty Pharmaceutical Company I have found their product to be consistently what it's supposed to be. The FDA watches them like a hawk.

 

[Pablo Cruise]

There you go you have someone who uses thyroid and knows more about the Armour brand. I am unaware that Armour changed hands.

 

[mostlylurking]

There you go you have someone who uses thyroid and knows more about the Armour brand. I am unaware that Armour changed hands.

about Armour thyroid:

 

[Wen]

Armour Thyroid is desiccated thyroid from animals. It is considered slightly more consistent in potency than other desiccated thyroid products. The others may vary in potency because the Armour is a so called name brand. It is best to stick to one brand and if me I would use Armour as long as I could afford. Remember desiccated thyroid is t3 and t4 whereas L- thyroxine is purified t3. I believe after many years........that some people fair better with desiccated form but many are fine on t3.

So they're basically all the same thing but Armour has a more consistent potency? That wouldn't seem to explain why it's prescription only though if other non prescription products could easily be more potent if they're not as consistent.

 

[Wen]

about Armour thyroid:

He says it's more consistent than Synthroid which is also prescription but I really want to know what the difference is between Armour and non prescription natural desiccated thyroid from supplement companies which you can buy without prescription...since they are both described as 'natural desiccated thyroid'.

 

[Jennifer]

He says it's more consistent than Synthroid which is also prescription but I really want to know what the difference is between Armour and non prescription natural desiccated thyroid from supplement companies which you can buy without prescription...since they are both described as 'natural desiccated thyroid'.

From my understanding, prescription NDTs such as Armour are standardized whereas most over-the-counter glandulars aren’t. I’ve contacted some of the supplement companies selling over-the-counter thyroid glandulars like Professional Formulas and Ancestral Supplements and though they confirmed that the entire gland is used in their glandulars so calcitonin isn’t extracted to be sold as a separate product, something I heard that the makers of Armour do, their glandulars aren’t standardized so they couldn’t tell me the actual amount of T4 and T3 their glandulars contain because it varies from batch to batch.

Of course, as Ray pointed out, there can still be variability with standardized NDT. Just last August, batches of the prescription NDT I was on, WP Thyroid, as well as Nature-Throid, were recalled for subpotency and batches of NP Thyroid were recalled last May for superpotency and again in September for subpotency. I’ve read that part of the problem is that many manufacturers have used iodine content rather than actual thyroid hormone to standardize their preparations and though some manufacturers like Armour perform bioassays to maximize batch-to-batch reproducibility, the range of levothyroxine and liothyronine can still vary greatly, even in products standardized by bioassay instead of iodine content.

 

[mostlylurking]

He says it's more consistent than Synthroid which is also prescription but I really want to know what the difference is between Armour and non prescription natural desiccated thyroid from supplement companies which you can buy without prescription...since they are both described as 'natural desiccated thyroid'.

I think that Dr. Peat was speaking in the past tense when he told that story. His point was that at the time Armour's competition was trying to put them out of business by saying that Armour's quality wasn't reliable and Synthroid's was reliable. Doctors had relied on Armour thyroid for many years; they didn't trust the synthetic Synthroid because they could see that their patients didn't do as well on it as they did on Armour. So the promoters of the synthetic lied about the quality of Armour. The makers of the synthetic T4 have been zealously persistent in their goal to shut down makers of reliable desiccated thyroid. The old doctors died and the new doctors have been brainwashed about it. It isn't easy to find a doctor willing to prescribe natural desiccated thyroid.

The FDA today is all over the natural desiccated thyroid manufacturers regarding quality and reliable consistency. I do not know about the consistency of Synthroid's ingredients today. All I know about Synthroid is that it does not work unless you are male and not older than maybe 22. If you have estrogen for your liver to detox, your liver can't convert T4 into T3 without some T3 to prime the process. Today's doctors are not taught about this.

I'm in the U.S. I rely on prescription natural desiccated thyroid (Acella) because it consistently works. The FDA is on top of this issue with a vengeance; I suspect they would love to put Acella out of business. Acella runs a tight ship. I called them last summer because I was having hypothyroid symptoms and I thought maybe their product had changed or the batch had possibly been recalled. It was a Sunday. Their quality control representative called me within hours. It turned out my problem was the digital thermometers (5 of them) that I had used were not reliable. My old mercury thermometer results showed 98.6 so I wasn't below 97 degrees after all.

Dr. Peat suggests some reliable thyroid products, that are prescription meds in the U.S. but available overseas without a prescription. I trust Dr. Peat's suggestions. However, I have chosen to rely on my endocrinologist and prescription natural desiccated thyroid; I've take it for over 30 years, first Armour, then Acella. Acella brand thyroid is fairly new on the market (less than 10 years I think). My 84 year old endocrinologist has been prescribing it to his patients for about 6 years. He's very happy with it and says it works just like the original old Armour used to work.

Here's an article about over the counter thyroid glandulars: Are Thyroid Glandular Supplements Safe?

Here's a link to a site I found that might be helpful: Where To Begin?

 

[mostlylurking]

He says it's more consistent than Synthroid which is also prescription but I really want to know what the difference is between Armour and non prescription natural desiccated thyroid from supplement companies which you can buy without prescription...since they are both described as 'natural desiccated thyroid'.

Information for you: Natural desiccated thyroid products - Toxinless Lots of pertinent info there.

 

[Wen]

Information for you: Natural desiccated thyroid products - Toxinless Lots of pertinent info there.

But Armour is not mentioned there is it? So it says the cost per 1 gram of NDT so I can use this to compare with Armour I guess? I'm mainly asking this because I can't get T3 where I am and can't get hold of Amour either but these 'generic' NDT products are of course easily available to me.

 

[mostlylurking]

edit

 

[mostlylurking]

But Armour is not mentioned there is it? So it says the cost per 1 gram of NDT so I can use this to compare with Armour I guess? I'm mainly asking this because I can't get T3 where I am and can't get hold of Amour either but these 'generic' NDT products are of course easily available to me.

Where are you? There are links in the article to lists of meds available in the U.S. and also in the U.K. The point of the article is to explain that the pharmaceutical meds are highly regulated so their content is known. The over the counter supplements are not stringently regulated and their contents are not consistent, non-existent, sometimes way too high, could be spiked with amphetamines.

If I were choosing a natural desiccated thyroid it would not be Armour. It would be Acella; it's not named Acella in the list below but it is called "NP Thyroid" on its prescription label and listed as NP Thyroid below. Its contents match the contents described below.

NP Thyroid​

Generic Name: thyroid desiccated (THYE roid (DES i kay ted))
Brand Name: Armour Thyroid, Nature-Throid, NP Thyroid, Westhroid, WP Thyroid

NP Thyroid 30: Package Insert - Drugs.com

NP Thyroid 30 package insert / prescribing information for healthcare professionals. Includes: indications, dosage, adverse reactions and pharmacology.

www.drugs.com

NP Thyroid (thyroid tablets, USP) for oral use is a natural preparation derived from porcine thyroid glands. They contain both tetraiodothyronine sodium (T4 levothyroxine) and triiodothyronine sodium (T3 liothyronine) providing 38 mcg levothyroxine (T4) and 9 mcg liothyronine (T3) per grain of thyroid. The inactive ingredients are calcium stearate, dextrose monohydrate, maltodextrin and mineral oil.

Here's the info for Armour: Armour Thyroid - FDA prescribing information, side effects and uses

Armour Thyroid Description​

Armour® Thyroid (thyroid tablets, USP)* for oral use is a natural preparation derived from porcine thyroid glands and has a strong, characteristic odor. (T3 liothyronine is approximately four times as potent as T4 levothyroxine on a microgram for microgram basis.) They provide 38 mcg levothyroxine (T4) and 9 mcg liothyronine (T3) per grain of thyroid. The inactive ingredients are calcium stearate, dextrose, microcrystalline cellulose, sodium starch glycolate and opadry white.

 

[Wen]

Where are you? There are links in the article to lists of meds available in the U.S. and also in the U.K. The point of the article is to explain that the pharmaceutical meds are highly regulated so their content is known.

I'm in China. Yeah if I were in the UK or USA it would be easy to get hold of something. In China you can get the normal T4 type thyroid medication online without prescription but I haven't found anything with T3 in it. I used to be able to get hold of stuff from Indian pharmacies but they don't deal with China anymore due to recent events last year. I can purchase from idealabs but that is way too expensive.

 

[mostlylurking]

I'm in China. Yeah if I were in the UK or USA it would be easy to get hold of something. In China you can get the normal T4 type thyroid medication online without prescription but I haven't found anything with T3 in it. I used to be able to get hold of stuff from Indian pharmacies but they don't deal with China anymore due to recent events last year. I can purchase from idealabs but that is way too expensive.

Here's a link to a Danny Roddy blog post: https://www.patreon.com/posts/14839477 There are a few links in it that are for thyroid pharmaceutical grade supplements. Maybe that will help.

 

[Wen]

Here's a link to a Danny Roddy blog post: https://www.patreon.com/posts/14839477 There are a few links in it that are for thyroid pharmaceutical grade supplements. Maybe that will help.

Two links there, one doesn't ship to China but the other one does! Great, thanks for your help.

 

[mostlylurking]

Two links there, one doesn't ship to China but the other one does! Great, thanks for your help.

You're welcome, glad I could help.

 

[UG Krishnamurti]

What do you guys think about Life Giving Store NDT?
Does anybody have any experience with them?

I ordered it because any supplement in pill/tablet form - because of their impurities - make me bleed out of my intestine and therefore create a cascade of inflammatory things from which I cannot get out of for months.

 

[Birdie]

What do you guys think about Life Giving Store NDT?
Does anybody have any experience with them?

I ordered it because any supplement in pill/tablet form - because of their impurities - make me bleed out of my intestine and therefore create a cascade of inflammatory things from which I cannot get out of for months.

I haven't tried it but will sure be interested in your results.

 

[UG Krishnamurti]

will sure be interested in your results.

That's the thing we have in common!