Written by Steve on 23 August 2010
As I’ve cast around for ways to make my family member more resistant to cancer reoccurence I’ve run across a lot of crazy claims.
The majority of them have been looked at and discarded after careful consideration because there wasn’t any real evidence to support the claims, and I simply couldn’t figure out any way that they might be true or helpful.
However, the concept of iodine supplementation gains credibility with almost every enquiry I make.
We’ve talked about convergences between today’s theories and data and Doctor Gerson’s theories and practices in previous posts – and in one of those posts we briefly touched on the convergences of iodine supplementation.
What we haven’t really talked about is the fact that the most successful cancer healers of old – the ‘Quacks’, if you want to see them that way – incorporated similar types and quantities of iodine into their remedies.
That’s interesting.
For, although the conventional medicine folk would like you to believe that there was absolutely nothing to those healers’ claims of success treating cancers, I would like to put forth this thought for your consideration.
Do you REALLY think that people are that stupid? Do you REALLY think that people would keep going to these guys – even when they were being publically accused of being ‘Quacks’ and charlatans if nobody ever got ‘cured’ or helped in any way?
I don’t.
It is my opinion that people – even desperate people – are actually quite intelligent when it comes to figuring out where to go to try to save their lives. Especially those who have decided to forsake traditional treatments or those who have been through those treatments and then cast to the side to die. Money is always tight. It does not get frittered away someplace where believable and verifiable objective evidence of cures does not exist. The treatment might not work and they might die anyway, but I’m pretty sure they see what they’re trying as a viable option or they wouldn’t be there.
So, I pay attention to what was used in these so called ‘cures’ – from a Pharmacist’s point of view - and look for convergences.
I count this convergence as significant.
Significant enough that we’ve had many discussions about it amongst ourselves in the Pharmacy – and several of us, including the most hard core non-believers, have started ourselves and our loved ones on iodine supplements.
I will remind you, these are Pharmacists who have done this. Cold, hard, non-believing, conservative Pharmacists. We know I’m crazy, but I assure you they are not.
The conversations have been prolonged and intense enough that family members became aware of them before we Pharmacists had even made up OUR minds.
In fact, I remember waking up one day to find the family member who has been having to deal with cancer sitting on the side of the bed with a piece of paper in her hand. She handed it to me and told me that she’d asked her doctor what she/he thought about this iodine and thyroid supplementation ‘stuff’ – fully expecting to have a good laugh about it. In reply to the question the physician had handed her a copy of a document that talked about the use of iodine supplementation to cure fibrocystic breast disease, and the use of iodine supplementation and dessicated thyroid to treat what is now being called Type 2 Hypothyroidism and Hashimoto’s Disease.
I read that darned piece of paper – which was written by a doc for docs – multiple times.
Ultimately I found myself deciding that I’d better figure out the potential mechanisms behind these claims – and pretty darned quickly, because my family member was now hounding me for answers.
The best information I’ve found on this topic is at the website of a company that manufactures an iodine supplement called Iodoral™. That company’s name is Optimox, and their website is www.optimox.com. You can find their iodine supplementation papers at this website address – http://www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/opt_Research_I.shtml . These papers were written by several physicians who have dedicated vast amounts of time to researching the history of iodine’s use in general, and its use to treat diseases in particular. They use iodine every day in their practices, as far as I can tell.
Another extremely valuable resource is the book ‘Hypothyroidism Type 2: The Epidemic’ by Doctor Mark Starr. His website is http://www.21centurymed.com/.
Doctor Jerry Tennant – the founder of the Tennant Institute for Integrative Medicine – also has interesting things to say about iodine supplementation at his website (http://www.tennantinstitute.com/TIIM_MAC/Iodine.html), in his book ‘Healing is Voltage: The Handbook (Vol. 1)’, and in his ‘How To Stay Well Pamphlet’. You can buy the book on Amazon.com and you can get the pamphlet for free at http://www.tennantinstitute.com/TIIM_MAC/Patient_Forms.html.
If you’d like to hear Dr Tennant and Dr Starr explaining their thoughts on a wide range of health topics listen to the series of youtube video posts starting with this one – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEtLFZUAlV0 .
To really briefly summarize my findings it seems that most people – especially women – should be taking 6.25mg-12.5mg of iodine per day. There are two ways to do this. The first is the use of Lugol’s Iodine Solution. There are two strengths – a 2% and a 5%. Both contain iodine and potassium iodide. The 2% solution contains 2.5mg of iodine per drop, and the 5% contains 6.25mg/drop. So, one drop of 5% Lugol’s in a couple of ounces of water will give you the minimum that the people who believe in iodine supplementation say you should be taking. The other method is the use of iodine supplement tablets like the Iodoral™ tablet marketed by Optimox.
I use the 2% Lugol’s solution made by the J. Crow Company ( http://www.jcrows.com/ ). One of the other pharmacists uses the 5% Lugol’s and the Optimox tablets. Another uses only the Optimox tablets. The tradeoffs are that it’s a pain in the you-know-what to have to dilute the Lugol’s every time, and it tastes like iodine while the tablets are a little more costly, contain 12.5mg of iodine per tablet, and don’t taste like iodine.
Women are claimed to need much more iodine than men because the second and third biggest consumers of iodine are a woman’s breasts and ovaries. This is why goiters are reported to be 6 times more common in women than in men. Both men and women need iodine throughout the body – not just for the thyroid gland. The amount of iodine in table salt is nowhere near what your total body needs – at least that’s the claim of these Docs – and it appears that salt actually fights against the absorption of the iodine.
OK. I believe.
The bottom line is that I’ve witnessed and experienced verifiable objective evidence that iodine supplementation works. That’s why I’m writing about it here.
BUT – Don’t try it without asking your physician if it’s OK. There are conditions that might be made worse by iodine. Once you get your Doc’s OK take a look at some of the articles at the Optimox site, and buy and read a copy of Dr Starr’s book. Doctor Tennant’s book is also a good one to get and take a look at – especially if you’re looking for alternative health strategies. Take a look at Dr Tennant’s pamphlet – it’s free. Then, once you understand what is claimed and what to watch out for, start your doses low and go slow when you’re adjusting your doses.
Again, I’m Crazy – so always get your physician’s approval before you try what I’m writing about on this blog. I believe in what I’m writing, but the human body is an extremely complex machine, and only someone who has the training to put hands on you and assess your physical condition is qualified to give the OK to new medications and/or regimens.
Remember – Pharmacists Pharmacist – Doctors Doctor.
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