Some patients with hyperthyroidism have been treated with anti-thyroid medication, but the efficacy is relatively poor, with many relapses and years of suffering from the disease and mental and physical exhaustion. Some patients are unaware of the availability of hyperthyroidism iodine-131 treatment or refuse to change their mindset and receive iodine-131 treatment for hyperthyroidism. The following patient’s treatment situation gives insight and reference from the patient’s perspective. I am now in the United States. I had hyperthyroidism some time ago and had iodine-131 treatment in the United States. I found out that people in China have a completely different understanding of Iodine-131 than American and Western medicine, and I met with the best doctors at the Peking Union Medical College and the 307th Hospital (and my parents’ friends made a private appointment for me), so I would like to share my experience with you here and give you some information that I hope will be useful to you if you are going to have Iodine-131 treatment. I was found out to have hyperthyroidism 1 month ago, and I have been taking TAPAZOL for 2 weeks. I have no history of taking any medication for hyperthyroidism (TAPAZOL) before, and I took Iodine-131 capsules 1 week ago. Well, huh! First of all, Iodine-131 can cause hypothyroidism 100% of the time, the most authoritative endocrinologist in China told me so, but Chinese doctors are conservative in their dosage, so some people get hypothyroidism very quickly, some people start to lose it after 10 years, some people may have it after 20 years, and so on. The American doctors told me directly that I should take thyroxine tablets for the rest of my life, because the American doctors are relatively large in dosage, so basically they all have hypothyroidism within 1 or 2 years. In China, some patients who got hypothyroidism later doubted the doctor’s medical ethics or something, which is quite unwarranted. In fact, I personally think that the size of the measurement does not matter, the Americans think that since sooner or later they will have hypothyroidism, it is better to let the body adapt to this state early, and then more check-ups, timely adjustment of the amount of thyroxine. Chinese doctors think it is good to be conservative, but if the dosage is too conservative, many people can’t be completely cured by taking Iodine 131 once, and they have to use Iodine 131 twice or three times, but in the end, it will lead to hypothyroidism. But hypothyroidism is not terrible. In the United States, hypothyroidism is cured because the risk is much lower than hyperthyroidism. By the way, I would like to tell you about the treatment of hyperthyroidism in the US. Doctors in the US tell their patients that the possibility of relapse is very high, only 20% to 30% of people will be cured (about 2.5 years). Especially in women who have not had children, it is almost inevitable that they will relapse during pregnancy, and then they will have to take medication to control it. Therefore, most women in the United States choose to have iodine-131, because it is psychologically and physically torturous to have frequent checkups. Another important point is that doctors in the United States generally recommend Iodine-131 if you are planning to get pregnant, and it is generally accepted in American medicine that there is a risk of taking the drug during pregnancy, even with PTU, and that even if the child is born healthy, the IQ is more than 10 points lower than that of a normal child. Therefore, if you are planning to get pregnant, almost all Americans are treated with Iodine-131 first. Secondly, the American doctors talked to me for almost 3 hours before my treatment to relieve all my worries and doubts, and they told me that this technology is very mature for decades. The two main concerns are 1. Will it affect conception and pregnancy? The answer is that the risk is the same as a normal pregnancy. 2. Will I be more likely to get cancer? They told me that the risk is the same as a healthy person. I also asked if it would affect my life expectancy, and I was told that it would not affect my life expectancy at all (lest anyone doubt it, I have health insurance and it’s cheap, which means they won’t make me do Iodine-131 just to make money, which is more expensive than Iodine-131). I was also told that it was like buying food to eat because my family can’t produce it, and that taking thyroid tablets in time is like a normal person and there is no need to worry. Perhaps you are concerned about the advice I received from Chinese doctors, I met with 4 doctors (I won’t mention their names, they are basically the most authoritative), 2 from Xiehe and 2 nuclear medicine doctors from 307. Three of them advised me to use Iodine-131, and one doctor thought I could take the medicine first if I was not heavy, but did not oppose Iodine-131. Thirdly, most people do not feel anything after taking Iodine-131, 20% of them will have a transient aggravation, I think many people do not know or ignore this, thinking they are very poor, but in fact it is completely normal, usually after 2 weeks they will feel better, or 4 weeks for slower ones. It takes 4 weeks to feel comfortable, but up to 8 weeks should feel very good. I’m feeling weak and nauseous, but today I don’t feel much, just a little tired after moving around. Well, that’s about it, I hope it’s useful. I have friends in the US during my illness, and they are all very optimistic, so I hope that my words will be useful to you, and that you will have more confidence in the treatment. In the U.S., we do continuous checkups to see when we start to lose, and when we lose, we take thyroxine tablets immediately, and then all the levels of the thyroid gland are normal, and it is recommended that the dosage of thyroxine tablets be adjusted with frequent checkups (once a year or so). So hypothyroidism is temporary (very short-lived in the United States is currently checking me once a month, so that is hypothyroidism will be found in a month at most) — because you will always be observed by the doctor, after the reduction immediately take the replacement thyroxine, after eating and normal people exactly the same ah! The only drawback is that the amount you need in your body changes with age and life changes, and we have no way to calculate very precisely how much we need, so we have to go to the hospital half a year to see if the amount we are currently taking is appropriate. Permanent hypothyroidism means not taking any replacement thyroxine tablets at all, but after Iodine-131, people basically become hypothyroid, and in the US they start taking thyroxine tablets after Iodine-131, unless you don’t take them (but no one does, right?). However, American medicine believes that thyroxine tablets are the same as those secreted by the human body, without any side effects, just like the food we eat, which is no more harmful to the body than years of medication. I have looked up almost everything in English about this disease and treatment, even if it can help a little. Most of the country does not have a comprehensive enough understanding of iodine-131. People here in the US are treated with iodine-131 and then take thyroxine tablets, and don’t take it as a disease at all. So I hope we can all be optimistic. If you are planning to get pregnant in the US (for example, I am 24 years old and plan to get pregnant in 2 years), you will get pregnant only after Iodine-131 treatment. I can say that if you are planning to get pregnant, Iodine-131 is the first choice, because it is easy to relapse with medication, especially when you are pregnant and your body hormone level changes, it is very rare to take medication while pregnant in the United States, because doctors believe that taking medication during pregnancy will not deform the child, but it will have some effect on the intelligence of the fetus – although it is not retarded, although it is a healthy baby, but it will not be very smart. Generally, Iodine-131 can be taken after half a year, but some doctors recommend to take it after one year if you are conservative (of course, you should always take thyroxine tablets, which are not drugs, but just tablets to supplement the thyroxine produced by our body.) Nowadays, more and more people are using Iodine-131 in China, and the technology in China has become more mature, especially in big cities where thousands of cases are done every year, so it should be very good if people do it in China. I found that this is the difference between Chinese and Western cultures and concepts. Chinese people are more conservative, because it is better to take medication to adjust, while doing Iodine-131, if you do it, you will be hypothyroid for life, you will have to take thyroxine replacement for life, and you feel like taking medication for life. In fact, eating this is like eating every day, the body does not produce so much thyroxine, so we add some externally. In fact, this is a cultural difference. The Chinese would rather be pregnant with medication than do iodine-131. this depends on personal perception, huh?