Patients are urged to report any allergies to their physician. It is especially important that patients report allergies to pork if they are considering taking desiccated pig thyroid (natural thyroid hormone).

Other conditions that may affect a patient’s ability to take thyroid medications include:

• Arrhythmias (abnormal heart rhythms), atherosclerosis or other cardiovascular disease
  
  
• Diabetes
  
  
• Certain other endocrine diseases, such as unresolved Addison’s disease (adrenal insufficiency) or an underactive pituitary gland (hypopituitarism)
  
  
• Kidney disease, such as proteinuria, diabetic nephropathy or end-stage renal disease
  

  

• Liver disease
  
  
• Malabsorption diseases (e.g., celiac disease, lactose intolerance, cystic fibrosis, Whipple disease)
  
  
• Osteoporosis