Thyroid for Dummies

Water damage and falling apart.

A great introduction to the world of thyroid disorders. Includes everything from finding a specialist, the initial diagnosis, starting treatment and what to expect throughout the entire process. I have skimmed through other books on the subject and Thyroid for Dummies gives the best 'cram session' overview and has humor throughout the pages and even some cartoons! It really breaks up the monotony of page after page of grey text.

As a person that has an underactive thyroid, myself, and finding that a LOT of other books on the matter barely scratch the surface, this book is an informative change. The sections are easily navigated and understood without the content being dumbed down to an elementary level of thinking. I was especially impressed that Dr. Ruben had touched on the psychological state of people with this medical issue, my pre-diagnosed years make more sense now. I have since lent this book to my mother so she can become more informed as well. I highly recommend this to anyone who has, knows of or thinks they know of someone with a thyroid problem. It certainly gives you the information you need to understand.

I am a 4+ year Graves disease veteran who is currently in remission. I strongly believe that EVERY newly diagnosed person should read this book BEFORE they make any decision on any PERMANENT treatment procedure such as surgery or radioactive iodine ablation (RAI).Dr. Rubin takes the often confusing subject of thyroid disease and makes it easily understandable to the newly diagnosed. Every person with a diagnosed thyroid disorder SHOULD be reading this book and educating themselves about their disease!Misinformation is abundant when it comes to thyroid disease. Dr. Rubin makes no bones about HIS preference for treatment of hyperthyroidism/Graves disease and lays out his well thought out, logical, reasons behind HIS preference for treatment with anti-thyroid meds very well (page 73). I was thrilled to see this recommendation as this was the route I chose...and fought to continue using for 4 years...with success in the form of total remission after 4.3 years of anti-thyroid medication.Thank you Dr. Rubin for speaking up and telling it like it is about anti-thyroid medication...that you CAN take it for as long as you need it...that there is NO time frame limit for these meds, and the adverse reaction risk is very low. You're my hero!

My spouse has been battling with Hyperthyroidism for 15 years, going on and off PTU and in and out of remission. Her latest annual blood work indicated that she was hyper again which re-opened the dialog about what treatment to choose (drug therapy, radioactive iodine, or surgery). Thyroid for Dummies provided a detailed yet very readable review of what the function of the Thyroid glad is, Thyroid disorders, treatment options, etc. If you are facing a decision point about treatment for a thyroid disorder or have Thyroid wellness concerns then I think you will find this book very helpful and informative as we did. In the end we choose Radioactive Iodine treatment. The unbiased facts and wealth of information provided helped us make this important and rather emotional decision in a manner that enabled us to move forward with confidence. Of note, the author Dr. Rubin prefers drug therapy as the first mode of treatment for Graves Disease. As this had already been tried in our case and did not provide a predictable and sustainable treatment we choose Radioactive Iodine over surgery.

I just had thyroid surgery and I picked up a copy of Thyroid for Dummies so I could get informed about what was happening. Thyroid for Dummies answered all my questions, and gave me all the information I needed to understand what I was going through.After reading this book, I know more about the thyroid gland than I did before! The book is written in easy to understand language, and uses humor which put my mind at ease. I would highly recommend this book to anyone with thyroid disease, anyone undergoing thyroid surgery,and anyone who just wants to know more about their thyroid gland.