Daily Steps To Heal The Most Common Autoimmune Disease

Dr. Mark Hyman (0:00)

Coming up on this episode of The Doctors' Pharmacy.

Dr. George Papanicolaou (0:03)

Hashimoto's is the most common cause of hypothyroidism. It's seen as a thyroid condition.

Dr. Mark Hyman (0:09)

Yeah.

Dr. George Papanicolaou (0:10)

It's really an autoimmune condition that affects the thyroid.

Dr. Mark Hyman (0:13)

And this is the most common autoimmune disease in America, right?

Dr. Mark Hyman (0:17)

Hi, this is Lauren Feehan, one of the producers of The Doctors' Pharmacy podcast. Conventional treatment for autoimmune diseases like Hashimoto's gives little hope to those who are suffering. But through the lens of functional medicine, we're able to uncover the underlying factors that contribute to the autoimmune disease and begin to treat them at their root. In today's episode, we feature three conversations from The Doctors' Pharmacy about why it is vital to look at the whole body when treating Hashimoto's or any autoimmune disease. Dr. Hyman speaks with Dr. George Papanicolaou on the food ingredient that is often behind a Hashimoto's diagnosis.

With Dr. Elizabeth Boehme on advanced functional medicine testing and with Drew Proed on the role of inflammation in autoimmune diseases like Hashimoto's, let's jump in.

Dr. George Papanicolaou (1:04)

27 million Americans have thyroid dysfunction and 12 percent more are likely to get it every year. Hashimoto's is the most common cause of that dysfunction, particularly hypothyroidism.

And Hashimoto's is an autoimmune process. What is autoimmunity? It's when your body's immune system starts making antibodies against your own tissue. And in this particular case, it's the thyroid.

Dr. Mark Hyman (1:31)

And this is the most common autoimmune disease in America, right?

Dr. George Papanicolaou (1:34)

It is. It is.

Dr. Mark Hyman (1:34)

And we don't really treat it as an autoimmune disease.

Dr. George Papanicolaou (1:37)

No, we treat it as hypothyroidism. So when I, there are probably many women, and we speak mostly about women because they make up a large number of the patients we see with Hashimoto's.

So, and a large number of these women do not feel better when they're treated. And they get diagnosed with hypothyroidism without ever being tested for Hashimoto's. And the reason being is, I think, the big disconnect in conventional medicine. And that is that it's not, it's seen as a thyroid condition. And it's really an autoimmune condition that affects the thyroid. And in that setting, with that mindset and that paradigm, the thought is, well, it doesn't really matter where the hypothyroidism comes from because the belief is that there's nothing to impact that immune response against the thyroid.

In conventional medicine, you just sort of let that immune response continue flaming until the thyroid is burnt out. And then the person is on whatever dose of thyroid medication will get their thyroid number, their TSH, into the normal range. And that's considered good medicine. One problem, one problem, there's a lot of women running around with a normal TSH that still feel like crap.

Dr. Mark Hyman (2:58)

That's right. That's right. So a lot of people who are diagnosed, by the way, half of people with low thyroid are not diagnosed.

Dr. George Papanicolaou (3:06)

Oh, yeah.

Dr. Mark Hyman (3:07)

So that's a problem in and of itself. And if you're talking about 20% of women, it's a lot of people. And 10% of men, it's a lot of people.

That's one problem. The second problem is, like you said, we treat it by just giving people thyroid replacement without actually dealing with the root cause of why their thyroid isn't working in the first place.

And it's like the same way we treat all other autoimmune disease, which is we say, oh, there's inflammation, let's give you an anti-inflammatory drug, right? There's Advil or steroids or chemotherapy drugs or immune suppressants that are super powerful and cause cancer and overwhelming infection and death in many people. We don't go, what's the cause of the inflammation? So George, with Hashimoto's, which is again so common, what causes the autoimmune disease in hypothyroidism, in this particular kind of autoimmune disease?

Dr. George Papanicolaou (4:06)

There's no clear understanding of the exact mechanisms that cause the immune system to go awry. There are some theories and there are some associated conditions. One of the strong thoughts is that, again, I should go back, I want to get this in a more clear model.

Autoimmune diseases tend to cluster. If you have one, you're much more likely to have another. The reason why Hashis is most prevalent is that there's a strong connection between Hashimoto's and gluten. That a large number of patients that have Hashis also have genes that make them more predisposed to gluten sensitivity and celiac disease.

Gluten therefore is seen as a pretty strong trigger to Hashimoto's. I would say if you're thinking about what's the one thing that you can do if you think you have Hashis, go gluten free.