Dr. David Minkoff’s Health Blog

Adrenal Fatigue Causes and Prevention – OHR #464

Optimum health report 464

Ready for a paradox?

Modern medicine is in many ways medieval and out of touch with our biology and many times it is anti our biology. Medicine of 100 years ago can be very modern, as it is in harmony with our biology. As an example, my friend and Pharmacist Carol Peterson wrote this review of an article written 100 years ago featuring Dr. Eugene Hertoghe.  In that article, he beautifully describes his observations and ideas about “feeding” thyroid to patients with a marked constellation of symptoms. Good medicine should be life restoring, celebrating the intuition and observations by dedicated practitioners.

The Good Old Stuff
Thyroid Deficiency – A lecture presented to the New York Polyclinic School and Hospital, New York, New York on April 1914 by Dr. Eugene Hertoghe.

Dr. Eugene Hertoghe was a Belgium physician who became a foremost thyroid expert in his time. He became so noted for his keen observations that one of the signs of hypothyroidism – the disappearance of the outer third of the eyebrows – is named after him and called the “Sign of Hertoghe”. He was invited to address the International Surgical Congress at what is now Columbia/NY Presbyterian Hospital.

His presentation reads like a story. The narrative reveals his observations, the conclusions he drew, the serendipity of finding a research report describing the symptoms of a patient who had had their thyroid removed and applying this all to a hopeless case he had just encountered. His success with “feeding thyroid” with this first patient unsettled him so that he racked his memory and tracked down previous patients he had not been able to help before because he had failed to interpret their hypothyroid symptoms at the time.

He states that 9 of 10 people who suffer with hypothyroidism are women. Thyroid sufficiency is needed for menstruation, pregnancy, lactation and even the uterine involution after pregnancy.

Let’s start with menstruation. Very heavy menstrual bleeding or menorrhagia is a hallmark of thyroid defect.  

He also believed that women need a more decent supply of thyroid during menstruation. Headaches, muffled tone quality in the voice, lassitude, back pains and constipation may show up as low thyroid symptoms. He even recommends just adding thyroid supplementation during this time.

During a pregnancy, the thyroid gland becomes enlarged and produces much more thyroid hormone. He claimed that this additional thyroid hormone is responsible for the arrested menstruation which protects the fertilized egg. Chronic miscarriage could be tied into an insufficient amount of thyroid hormone available to stop menses.
Thyroid hormone has to be abundant for lactation. Women who have had a quick involution of the uterus also have a good milk supply. He suggested using thyroid supplementation when the milk supply is scanty and menstruation seems to return too early.

This encapsulates a small amount of the information, Dr. Hertoghe presented over 100 years ago. It’s interesting that a young woman who has heavy menstrual bleeding or complaints during menses today is much more likely to be prescribed birth control pills to regulate her cycle rather than to address an underlying low thyroid situation. Dr. Hertoghe applied his skills as a medical detective successfully during his career, becoming renowned for his expertise in thyroid defects. Today, practitioners are much more likely to depend upon blood tests, procedures such as ultrasound and curettage rather than to rely on their own sense of observation and experience. The question remains whether we are better off 100 years later or not.

Many thanks to Carol Petersen RPh, RNP for this information.

For my wife, Sue, and I when we were first learning about natural hormones, Dr Carol was one of our first mentors. She remains so today.

At LifeWorks, we UNDERSTAND hormones and how to optimize them for health. We are experts in thyroid hormone replacement and utilize Dr Hertoghe’s wisdom to the fullest. So many people that we see have “normal” thyroid blood tests and when we do a special test on their metabolism, show a low thyroid state. When we give them thyroid hormone replacement, they blossom. Only a handful of clinics in the US are able to do this metabolism testing. Without it, you CAN’T know how to properly dose thyroid hormones.

Because we learn from ancient wisdom, we are the new medicine. We get results. Call us if you need help.

Have a great week.

David I Minkoff, MD

Adrenal Fatigue Causes, Symptoms & Prevention

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About Dr. David Minkoff, Medical Director

Dr. David Minkoff graduated from the University of Wisconsin Medical School in 1974 and was elected to the “Phi Beta Kappa” of medical schools, the prestigious Alpha Omega Alpha Honors Medical Fraternity for very high academic achievement. He then completed both a Pediatric Residency and a Fellowship in Infectious Disease at the University of California at San Diego. He worked at the University of California and Children’s Hospitals in San Diego as an attending physician in infectious disease while conducting original research on Ribaviron, a broad spectrum anti-viral agent to fight disease. He also co-directed a neo-natal intensive care unit and worked in emergency medicine. In 1992, Dr. Minkoff’s wife Sue, a Registered Nurse, became interested in nutrition and health and began to go to lectures from some of the experts in the field. At the time, Dr. Minkoff was pretty fixed in his view of traditional medicine and it took a lot of convincing to get him to come to one of these lectures. After hearing Dr. Jeffrey Bland speak, Dr. Minkoff had a eureka moment and began pursuing the alternative field with a vengeance. Based on this new knowledge Dr. Minkoff and his wife set up a small clinic in 1997 to help some friends with their medical problems. What began as an experiment blossomed into Lifeworks Wellness Center, one of the most successful clinics for complementary medicine in the United States. In the process, he gained expertise in Biological medicine, integrative oncology, heavy metal detoxification, anti-aging medicine, hormone replacement therapy, functional medicine, energy medicine, neural and prolotherapy, homeopathy, and optimum nutrition. He studied under the masters in each of these disciplines until he became an expert in his own right. Dr. Minkoff is one of the most in-demand speakers in the field and wrote an Amazon best-selling book called The Search For The Perfect Protein. The demand for the products and protocols he discovered became a catalyst for founding BodyHealth.Com, a nutrition company that now manufactures and distributes cutting-edge nutritional solutions for the many health problems of today. Dr. Minkoff writes two free online newsletters, “The Optimum Health Report” and ”The BodyHealth Fitness Newsletter”, to help others learn about optimum health and fitness. Dr. Minkoff is an avid athlete himself and has completed 43 Ironman Triathlons. To keep his fitness maximal, he lives the lifestyle he teaches to others and tries to set an example for others, so they can enjoy a life free of pain and full of energy.