Doctors are starting to listen to our complaints and, judging from the mentioned textbooks, are concerned that we are trading one disease for another and rushing into hypothyroidism needlessly. Writing in the North American Medical Clinics teaching texts in 1990, Dr. P. Singer describes this situation. He asserts that patients who are likely to go into remission without medical intervention are those with mild symptoms and low titers of stimulating TSH receptor antibodies. After all, it is these antibodies that are directly responsible for the hyperthyroidism of Graves' disease. The levels of thyroid hormone or TSH aren't predictive.
Many people have mild symptoms or have periods of variable symptom severity.
Often, the only way to find out if conventional treatment can be avoided is to adopt a holistic healing program and look for signs of improvement. Often, merely eliminating the triggers of Graves' disease such as iodine is sufficient for symptoms to alleviated. Another option is adding goitrogens to one's diets. Goitrogens, like antithyroid drugs, are substances, albeit food products, that interfere with the body's uptake of iodine. Many of the symptoms of GD are caused by nutrient deficiencies.