Radioactive iodine is absorbed by thyroid gland, where it forces the gland to shrink and symptoms to decrease, usually within three to six months. This treatment causes thyroid activity to slow considerably, victim may need to take medication every day to replace thyroxine. This meditation usually taken by mouth.
These drugs slowly decrease the symptoms of hyperthyroidism by preventing thyroid gland from secreting excess quantity of hormones. They consist of propylthiouracil and methimazole (Tapazole). Symptoms mostly start to improve in six to twelve weeks, but treatment with anti-thyroid drugs typically continues at least for a year and some time longer than a year. For some people, this resolve the problem forever, but other people may experience a revert. Both drugs can cause fatal liver damage, sometimes leading to death. As propylthiouracil has caused many cases of liver damage, it mostly should be used only when victim can’t tolerate methimazole.
Beta blockers are mostly used to treat high blood pressure (hypertension). They will not decrease thyroid levels, but they cab decrease a rapid heart rate and help prevent palpitations. Due to this reason doctor may prescribe them until thyroid levels are become normal.
Surgery is not used as often as the other treatments for this disease. The main reason for this is that the most common forms of hyperthyroidism are a result of overproduction from the entire gland (Graves’ disease) and the other methods described above work quite well in the many cases. In a thyroidectomy, doctor removes most of the thyroid gland from the body.
Side-effects of this surgery include damage to vocal cords and parathyroid glands four tiny glands located on the back of the thyroid gland that help in controlling the level of calcium in blood. Moreover, victim will need lifelong treatment with levothyroxine (Levoxyl, Synthroid and others) to provide the normal amount of thyroid hormone to the body. If parathyroid glands also are removed, victim will need drugs to keep blood-calcium levels normal.
If Graves’ disease acts on eyes (Graves’ ophthalmopathy), victim can manage temperate signs and symptoms by avoiding wind and bright lights and by consuming artificial tears and lubricating gels. If the symptoms are more severe, doctor may recommend treatment with corticosteroids, like prednisone, to decrease swelling behind the eyeballs. In some cases a surgical procedure may be use.
Orbital decompression surgery
In this procedure doctors pull out the bone between the eye socket and the sinuses. When the surgery is successful, it enhances the vision and provides room for the eyes to return to the normal position. But still there is a risk of complications, including double vision that persists or arises after surgery.
Eye muscle surgery
At times scar tissue from Graves’ ophthalmopathy can cause one or more than one eye muscles to be too short. This pulls eyes out of alignment, which causes double vision. Eye muscle surgery may assist to correct double vision by cutting the defected muscle from the eyeball and reattaching it farther back. The aim is to achieve single vision when the victim reads and looks straight ahead. In some cases, victim may need more than one operation to get these results.