Dr. Rodger Murphree is one of the resources Dr Spurlock, Lumigrate's 'in house' FM/CFS/environmental medicine specialist, suggests people learn from, saying "he's one of my mentors".
I found a link to the following information on Facebook today and thought I'd post it here: If you're reading this after these events, they are recorded and are readily available at his website. I set you up at the end with the link to go, so do .. go!
I also have added some of my thoughts that came from reading this, so I hope you gain from that as well.
Join me next Tuesday night, May 21st, 2013 at 7pm CST for the second, "May Q&A", in honor of National Fibromyalgia Awareness Day being this month.
Fibromyalgia & Low Thyroid Disorders
It is not unusual for patients to tell me that despite having all the symptoms associated with low thyroid, they have been tested over and over again for hypothyroidism but their tests are normal and their doctor tells them they are fine.
Well, doctors and you should realize that you aren't normal - "Normal bloodwork doesn't mean anything, it is only the start, the beginning, of the investigation. Those with fibro and/or CFS are different, strange, weird. OK special! Their biochemistry is different. It is no wonder they often have "low normal" or "high normal" bloodwork, which in their case suggests they are positive for that test.
Blood tests are based on samples from normal population or samples. You are special and your blood work needs to be scrutinized for any clues, otherwise you fall through the cracks. The herd mentality, "lazy", doctor is all too happy to recommend a mood elevating antidepressant, stimulating amphetamine, like Ritalin, pain pill or high cholesterol medication for the symptoms of low thyroid, missing the real problem, the cause: hypothyroid itself.
I believe the "art" of doctoring is taking the time to do the appropriate detective work, time to figure what the cause or causes are, not to merely treat symptoms because it is "what we do." Patients are more than an ICD insurance code, they are real live human beings, as unique and different on the inside as they are on the outside-there is no one test fits all. (READ MORE ...)
[ http://thefibrodoctor.com/fibromyalgia-and-low-thyroid-disorder/ ]
If You Missed Tuesday's Special May Q&A Tuesday Teleconference, you can listen to the recording here: Dr. Murphree's Teleconference Recordings [ http://drrodgermurphree.com/fibro-conference-recordings/ ]
In Honor of May 12th Being National Fibromyalgia Awareness Day ... I'll be doing weekly live call in programs where you can ask your questions and get my answers.
Do you want to know about reducing or eliminating a specific symptom associated with your fibromyalgia? Want to know my opinion about drugs you are taking-are they the right ones for you, are they safe, are they effective? Want to know what may be causing a specific symptom? Want to what I'd suggest for reducing or eliminating a specific symptom or condition? Do you want to learn more about my protocols, how I treat, what I recommend specifically for you?
Do you want to get my advice? For Free? If so, don't miss your opportunity to get some free one-on-one time with me. Call in Question and Answer Program Details: Join Me Every Tuesday Night For The Month Of May. I am hosting upcoming call-in programs on:
Tuesday May 21st & Tuesday May 28th Starting at - 8pm EST, 7pm CST, 6pm MST, and 5PM PST
LINK TO this item as I found it on Dr Murphree's website (again, GO!, please go, there's so much there to study!) archive.aweber.com/new_fms_sleep/AbL4k/h/Fibromyalgia_Low_Thyroid.htm
This generated a lot of thoughts for me. As the 'concierge' of Lumigrate, I am frequently approached for guidance related to the types of concerns Dr Murphree lists here: I believe for every person who has been 'diagnosed' and treated for hypothyroidism and the many other symptoms that stem from untreated low thyroid hormone circulating in the body (which includes the brain), there are at least a handfull out there who do NOT know what their symptoms mean, and what they're on the way to developing if not caught and addressed. Decades ago, I was one of those people and by my physicians who I went to regularly and entrusted with my health care as my 'primary care physicians' did not know what the signs and symptoms I had meant. Decades ago that is perhaps excuseable. Today it's flat-out inexcuseable and a 'shame'.
I'm not a shame-based person, so I'm not wanting to 'shame' anyone who is reading this more than for this moment: Get out of that shame place if you're a physician, give up something that takes time in order to LEARN THIS. The link is right here, to one of the nation's top experts. There are other national experts in this same forum to learn from and the forums at Lumigrate provide the results of my 'experience filter' for quality providers for learning. (My filter got finer the longer Lumigrate has been on the Internet too, as I quit trying to have collaborations with the experts because the bigger ones would not find it in their interests to take the time away from other things to be represented as a 'provider' at Lumigrate, hence doctors like Rodger Murphree aren't registered users with the ability to post words they write at Lumigrate, I simply copy and paste and link out to them and I get on to other things and don't spend my time trying to network for 1:1, I already have done that and have that with Dr Marc Spurlock, who frequently comments or posts new topics at Lumigrate.
Dr Spurlock's 'motto' and signoff line is "There is no one to blame, there is only take-action!" Frequently, people who have fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome (and etcetera, as I like to say) have been consumers of the allopathic medical model, not the functional medicine model. The allopathic model is what is in power and has been for generations now in the United States and beyond, where BigPharma is the go-to products, such as Dr Murphree has stated here.
Back when I had an in-person weekly education group in a large allopathic medicine building where I contracted as the occupational therapist within the PT clinic, I learned a lot about this frustration. For starters, the group was co-founded with Dr Chris Young, an allopathic psychologist who was also in the building and had a specialty with chronic pain.
We had collaborated for a couple of years on patients who came to him with brain injuries, and because of my having fibromyalgia and a massage therapist in town knowing that and where I worked, a flow of patients with chronic pain started coming to me, who I then referred to also be seen by Dr Young. Due to the success of the first one, he was inspired to want to start a group. We invited our successful patients to the first meeting and discussed the way they had been referred when they first had symptoms of CFS/FMS, and we'd laugh at the similarities of the studies.
Endocrinology wouldn't figure it out, neurology wouldn't know what to think of what was found, rheumatology got them going on medications that had terrible side effects OR they would turn them away and say 'you don't have anything autoimmune' and send them back to their primary care doctor. They'd be given orders for PT, and they'd go and be so flared up afterwards they'd not go back -- not call and cancel either by the way, sometimes, rather than 'confront' the clinic with the hard news of 'your therapist doesn't know enough about what I have to effectively treat me: they did harm to me and did NOT help me." (Lesson in that, give your providers feedback, in mature, adult ways.)
These now well-managed patients were FRUSTRATED in the past, and they would be great leaders in the group when the new people started coming, or so you'd think. But in reality, people doing 'well' and coming to an education group wanted to learn more advanced information that could help them, and unfortunately what happened when we got flyers into the hands of the 'patient mill' doctors who were in the building, they thought of their most 'difficult' patients with fibromyalgia and gave them or sent them a flyer to let them know about our group.
So every week we would literally have someone crying within minutes of the start time, 4 pm on Thursdays, because they finally had a place they felt would understand their issues. And the experienced people weren't there to help process a bunch of frustred, relieved people, so we basically had the need to individually process those people before having them come to the group and learn. And in a building the size we were in, which had 40,000 people in it's database, that meant we needed to get more therapists involved. Unfortunately, Dr Young had to drop from the group when a male therpist suddenly retired due to family medical reasons, and 4 pm on Thursdays were prime time for the young male patients his behavioral health clinic served.
These patients, whether they're in 2007 and in the live group or today and reading this via the Internet are often being sent out to specialists who run more tests (generating invoices and statements but typically do the results also come to the patient -- no the powerful doctor and their notes get the information, so note to patients: ask/insist your be added to the 'who gets a copy of this' when you check in for the study, whether that be imaging or bloodwork or whatever).
Too often the specialists also come up with nothing or come up with other things and treat other things and 'the window of opportunity' to turn things around with functional medicine's approach of finding the underlying reasons and fixing them was lost. Now they've spent a lot of money on copayments if they had insurance, and they've taken a lot of medications with side-effects and are in the allopathic world. They've gotten the 'fibromyalgia and fatigue runaround', which is ironic when they're exhausted. Hence the tears of relief and frustration, anger -- emotion -- when patients came to a group in a big allopathic medical building's educational conference rooms.
The Internet and Facebook in particular has, for those who use it proactively, taken the edge off of that for many people, there are uncountable pages, groups, 'boards' out there for people to commiserate and exchange ideas. I find them extremely frustrating to watch because there are so many people who are talking and not listening and learning. I can go to a site that I've seen for four years and someone will ask the most basic of questions. But are they taking the TIME to tune into something like this topic at Lumigrate -- and follow the link out and learn from an expert like Dr Murphree and then take action, as he suggests, by finding a functional medicine specialist?
Functional medicine is on it's way to replacing allopathic medicine in the United States -- it is projected by many experts this will occur by about 2020 or 2025. This is very important for people who have thyroid concerns to know, because if they're going to a medical provider who will likely still be working in medicine in the future, it will be in their best interests to start thinking like a detective doctor, and starting with one very common disorder, hypothyroidism, is a great place to start. Yes, it means you have to study and not be 'lazy', as Dr Murphree says.
I am in a position because of working in that building to commiserate with physicians though, and I wanted to stand up for them here related to Dr Murphree calling them "lazy": I know they would start their days at 7 am and be leaving just after 6 pm, and in the mean time all those orders they had to sign off on at the minimum, if not generate. The phone calls, the juggling of it all, it's harried and leaves them without enough time to properly eat, go for a walk mid-day in the sunshine, hydrate. The hydration isn't the problem with time, it's the elimination of urine when desirable quantities of water is consumed that is a problem when you're a health care worker in insurance-based, modern, allopathic medicine.
I know that we all were children once, wondering what we were going to 'be' when we grew up. How it was we ended up in human medicine has as many wonderful stories as there are providers. Typically we weren't motivated by money, though some were. Typically we were motivated by that we were interested in the courses you take in order to go on to the next step in education. I was good at math and sciences, for instance, in sixth grade I remember not doing well on a test for the first time, and it was history.
The medical providers of today did have an expectation of what our careers would look like once we put our time, energy and money into becoming educated and board certified to do what we do. And that has shifted so dramatically in the last decade or two that many of us; it's not what we 'signed up for'. Perhaps the younger physicians have a refreshed attitude about it because they knew what they were getting into when they 'signed up'.
Maintaining all that is involved with being certified in things is a lot of additional time, energy and money every year and, in my mind, that is why there is a big lack of advancement by most primary care physicians in learning the kind of information that Dr Murphree and others make VERY available to physicians to learn.
And there is literally a grief process that many of the older providers are going through, those who were complicityly going along with the BigPharma-financed medical training: many physicians simply did not see 'the game' that had gone on. They basically fell victim to the system they trusted and gradually have been getting out of denial and understandably would have their own anger on the way to processing the truth and accepting they were part of something that was not in the best interests of patients. Again, don't 'blame', just 'take action' if you have one of those providers or are one of those providers.
Hopefully ALL good physicians, no matter how long they are planning to work, who want to do what they went to school for will be able to process that and embrace functional medicine and look into the underlying causes the patient has symptoms and address those. For people with fibromyalgia, that starts witih PROPERLY testing the thyroid hormone system, but then also should include instructing the patient to become educated about diet being a major contributing factor: wheat/gluten, dairy/cassein, soy, corn, ... there are a couple handfulls of the most commonly consumed items in the diet that cause inflammation. Topical toxins, what is put on the skin that absorbs and starts to be in the bloodstream in under a minute.
Hormone dysruptors are all around us in our environment -- look at what you eat off of and drink out of for starters and then end with what's in the the air and water surrounding us all, connecting us all. I recently saw someone with many illnesses that are from environmental causes see something on Facebook that was pretty, like stained glass that is made in the home in the oven by melting plastic pellets that can be purchased for this purpose.
Why? Why promote a business that's creating something so toxic to our Earth. Look at the big picture about your lifestyle and at the details, and if you're a physician, teach that to your patients -- give them a handout of resources to study -- I did that for the top conditions we saw for hand/upper extremity therapy when I was in the big allpathic medical building in the past.
Have them come back to you frequently since you inevitably cannot spend much time with them due to the high numbers of patients needing to be seen in an hour anymore due to the decreasing amounts of funds insurance reimburses at a time when costs have skyrocketed, particularly due to electronics for billing and record-keeping.
For the patients/consumers out there: Read what I just wrote about the realities of the medical system and don't doubt your provider's intentions when they ask you to come back in a few days or weeks or months, at least to get you 'well underway' with what is a complex medical condition to treat. I used to go in with a daunting list of things that I wanted from my provider and realistically you can have basically have one item per fifteen minutes of time together in the room. General practitioners try to see a new patient every 10 minutes in many practices; ask your provider how many their benchmark is and be respectful of that schedule as much as possible.
And respect the other provider's time and expertise when it comes to money. I recently had someone trying to purchase a provider-only product through me and asking me to take my time and do something that I wasn't going to make any money off of because they wanted me to obtain the product for them and they'd get the wholesale price.
I'm an educational liaison who sets people up to be the YOU! of the Lumigrate YOU Model, not a supplements vendor, so I suggested the person talk to their local compounding and natural wellness pharmacy about the product AND educated them that if the professional business person/pharmacist takes the time to talk with them about a product they went to purchase, orders it, receives it, calls to let them know it has arrived, why would you expect that vendor to not get $10 of markup on the product? These pharmacies went OUT ON A LIMB to not take insurance, to provide products that are not universally endorsed and respected, and so have the physicians like Dr Murphree, Dr Spurlock and many others who don't go about things in a way that insurances easily accept.
Respect them, and they'll respect you. Whether you're a provider or a consumer. And if you bring an "A game" like that with you and are made to feel slighted, don't stay in the relationship, find another provider or let the consumer know that there are other resources and providers out there for them which might be a better fit. Professionally. Diplomatically. Appropriately.
Live and Learn. Learn and Live Better! ~~ Mardy
HOPE in the grass roots!
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Live and Learn. Learn and Live Better! is my motto. I'm Mardy Ross, and I founded Lumigrate in 2008 after a career as an occupational therapist with a background in health education and environmental research program administration. Today I function as the desk clerk for short questions people have, as well as 'concierge' services offered for those who want a thorough exploration of their health history and direction to resources likely to progress their health according to their goals. Contact Us comes to me, so please do if you have questions or comments. Lumigrate is "Lighting the Path to Health and Well-Being" for increasing numbers of people. Follow us on social networking sites such as:
Twitter: http://twitter.com/lumigrate and Facebook. (There is my personal page and several Lumigrate pages. For those interested in "groovy" local education and networking for those uniquely talented LumiGRATE experts located in my own back yard, "LumiGRATE Groove of the Grand Valley" is a Facebook page to join. (Many who have joined are beyond our area but like to see the Groovy information! We not only have FUN, we are learning about other providers we can be referring patients to and 'wearing a groove' to each other's doors -- or websites/home offices!) By covering some of the things we do, including case examples, it reinforces the concepts at Lumigrate.com as well as making YOU feel that you're part of a community. Which you ARE at Lumigrate!
