pdaz,

I would really monitor your liver enzymes carefully. Mine were elevated 8 times the normal amount within 7 weeks of taking just 5 mg a day. Not a common thing obviously, but it happens. I didn't have any symptoms and felt normal as well- no fever, no jaundice, no sore throat. So, it was quite the surprise! I was told to stop methimazole that day which I did. My liver enzymes returned to normal and the ultrasound (abdominal of the liver) came back fine as well. I ended up choosing surgery as there is a study that show that people who have issues with one medication (liver problems) will have a 50% chance of having the same type of issue on the other medication as well (PTU or methimazole). Definitely communicate with your doctor, but I would stop the methimazole for a week like he suggested and then retest your enzymes. 3 days after I stopped methimazole, my doctor had me do another round of liver testing and my numbers had come down (not normal at that point, but heading in the right direction). As others have said before, you can live without your thyroid, you can't live without your liver. Take care!

I think you should ask your doctor if you can reduce your dosage. Mine told me later that given my earlier hives, and the current elevated liver enzymes (which had been only slightly elevated before I went on Methimazole) she had to think about the risks and didn't want to make a fairly healthy woman in her 30s sick from a medication she prescribed. But she gave me a month to see if they would drop, and she said, “You came up with this treatment plan, and I it worked. I am glad!” If my enzymes had been super high or elevated over two cycles of blood draws (6-8 weeks) we probably could not have tried that strategy.
It certainly can't hurt to ask!

Could you explain further , what you mean by eye concerns. Did you have the eye issues prior to the surgery?

I currently have the eye issues and am trying to understand and learn as much as I can.

Thanks so much
Pam

Thank you all.

sorry to hijack this thread.

My Liver enzymes were borderline elevated before starting on Methimazole.

After 5-weeks, my T3 and T4 have come down to slightly elevated at this point and I feel great.

But the Liv enzymes are in between 3-4 times elevated. Completely stopping Methimazole would shoot the T3 and T4 back up and it can go dramatically up.

So I decided to reduce from 30mg to 10mg and test the Liv enzymes after a week. If there is no downward trend then I have to unfortunately stop Methimazole and look for other options.

Meanwhile I am looking for alternate natural solutions.
I have already controlled my diet to home-cooked and vegetarian diet.

Would appreciate any pointer/suggestions - anything is welcome

@pdaz - I would strongly suggest talking to your doctor on this issue before deviating from his/her recommendation.

If you review the “Treatment Options” thread in the announcements section of this forum, you can find the latest guidance on treatment of hyperthyroidism. If you pull up that document and do a search for “liver”, you can see the latest recommendations on baseline testing and if/when to stop the meds.

Also, that “Treatment Options” thread has some info about alternative therapies – unfortunately, at this time, there are no other options that have been proven to be both safe and effective in the treatment of hyperthyroidism.

Finally, you might want to remove your e-mail from the above post, as spammers often “troll” message boards like this one and grab any visible e-mail addresses. You can send a private message to another poster by viewing one of their posts and clicking on the PM icon that appears underneath their screen name. The system will “ping” whatever e-mail address the other person used to sign up to let them know that they have a private message waiting. (You have to be logged in to the system in order to view your private messages).

Take care!