Breast Cancer Prevention and Iodine Supplementation
 A good friend of ours just went through an ordeal with breast cancer. The incidence of breast cancer has increased to 1 in 8 women, with 4,000 new cases weekly. You might ask, could there be a preventive measure which is safe, cheap and widely available that has been overlooked? The answer is YES , and it’s the essential mineral, Iodine , which was added to table salt in 1924 as part of a national program to prevent Goiter. It turns out that this same Iodine in table salt is the key to breast cancer prevention as proposed by the following list of prestigious doctors: Guy Abraham, MD (1), Robert Derry MD PHD (2) (3), David Brownstein MD (4)(5), George Flechas MD (6)(20), Donald Miller, M.D. (7)(8)
Above Left Image: Mammogram showing small spiculated breast cancer
Our Diet is Iodine Deficient
 The problem is that we have been told to avoid salt because it causes high blood pressure, so dietary intake of iodine has dropped to low levels, and we have a generalized iodine deficiency in the population. Currently 15% of the US adult female population is classified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as iodine deficient. (9) We consume a large queatity of salt in processed food, however, the salt in processed foods is not iodized salt. Unfortunately iodized table salt is not a reliable way to supplement with Iodine, It makes sense to use an Iodine supplement.
Image upper left Courtesy Hain Salt: Iodized Sea Salt available at grocery store
The RDA for Iodine is too Low for Optimal Health
 According to Guy Abraham MD, our dietary intake of Iodine is too low, set at 150 mcg by the government RDA. Dr. Guy Abraham tells us that a healthier level of Iodine intake would be 100 times greater at 12.5 mg, which is the average Iodine intake for Japan, and this higher Iodine intake could explain why the Japanese have the lowest rates for cancer of the breast, prostate and thyroid.
Image Left: Courtesy Morton Iodized Salt
How Safe is Iodine Supplementation?
Iodine is purple
Very Safe. Iodine is the only trace element that can be ingested safely in amounts up to 100,000 times the RDA. For example, potassium iodide has been prescribed safely to large numbers pulmonary (COPD) patients in amounts of up to 6 grams per day for several years. This potassium iodide is a well known treatment for COPD which helps mobilize lung secretions. (18) The FDA has officially stated that Iodine supplementation is safe and actually recommends 165 mg of Iodine for adults in case of Radiation Emergency to protect the population from thyroid cancer. (17) “Iodine allergy” is a misnomer since this name applies to allergy to iodinated radiographic contrast agents, and not to elemental iodine which is quite different. (10)
Iodine Deficiency causes Fibrocystic Breast Disease,
Breast Cancer and Thyroid Cancer
 Iodine, a well known topical antiseptic and antimicrobial agent, also directly kills cancer cells and serves as the key player in our body’s surveillance system for removing abnormal pre-cancer cells. There is considerable medical research to support this statement. Dr. B.A. Eskin published 80 papers over 30 years researching iodine and breast cancer, and he reports that iodine deficiency causes breast cancer and thyroid cancer in humans and animals.(11)(12) Iodine deficiency is also known to cause a pre-cancerous condition called fibrocystic breast disease. (13) Ghent published a paper in 1993 which showed iodine supplementation works quite well to reverse and resolve fibrocystic changes of the breast, and this is again the subject of a current clinical study.(14)(15)
Upper Left Image: Povidone Iodine, a topical antiseptic, available OTC at the grocery or drugstore
Despite its obvious potential, not much has been done with Iodine treatment over the past 40 years in the United States. Since iodine isn't patentable and is therefore unlikely to be profitable to market, there is no money to fund studies for “FDA approval". However, FDA approval is not required since Iodine is already an additive to table salt at the supermarket.
Iodine Deficiency Diseases
As an interventional radiologist working in the hospital for 25 years, a large part of my job was evaluating thyroid abnormalities, nodules, and cysts with ultrasound, radionuclide scans, and needle biopsy. Although it was obvious these common thyroid abnormalities were due to iodine deficiency, I often wondered why none of the patients ever received iodine supplementation. The obvious answer is they should have been and that this is a blind spot in mainstream medicine.
Another part of my day was spent reading mammograms and breast ultrasound studies. Fibrocystic breast disease was quite common, and these women would return for needle aspiration procedure of the many breast cysts, and needle biopsy of the benign solid nodules. Many of these ladies returned multiple times for the procedures because the medical system had no useful treatment to offer them. Well, as we have just discussed, we now know there is a very useful medical treatment, namely, Iodine supplementation which not only resolves breast cysts and fibrocystic breast disease, it also resolves ovarian cysts and thyroid cysts. Actually Iodine supplementation has always been available, but again this is a blind spot in mainstream medicine, and hospital based physicians are unaware of it.
Which Iodine Supplement ?
 There are many Iodine supplements. Lugol's Solution has been used for many years. A new one is the 12.5 mg Iodoral tablet from Optimox (16) and is the iodine supplement tablet made by Dr. Guy Abraham, a former professor of obstetrics and gynecology at UCLA who started "The Iodine Project" in 1997, and engaged two family practice physicians, Jorge Flechas and David Brownstein to carry out clinical studies of the hypothesis that the body needs 12.5 mg of iodine a day. More than 4,000 patients in this project consumed Iodine supplements from 12 to 50 mg per day, and in those with diabetes, up to 100 mg a day. They reported their findings that Iodine does indeed reverse fibrocystic disease; diabetic patients require less insulin; hypothyroid patients require less thyroid medication; symptoms of fibromyalgia resolve, and patients with migraine headaches stop having them.
Image upper left Courtesy of Optimox: Iodoral, Iodine tablets
The Nobel laureate Dr. Albert Szent Györgi (1893–1986), the physician who discovered vitamin C, used Iodine freely in his medical practice. The standard dose of potassium iodide given in those days was 1 gram, which contains 770 mg of iodine.
Dr. Albert Szent Györgi writes: "When I was a medical student, iodine in the form of KI (Potassium Iodide) was the universal medicine. Nobody knew what it did, but it did something and did something good. We students used to sum up the situation in this little rhyme: If ye don’t know where, what, and why Prescribe ye then K and I"
Iodoral Tablets
In view of all the above, I take one Iodoral tablet (12.5 mg Iodine) daily as do all of my family members. Iodoral is available without a prescription as a nutritional supplement from VRP (Vitamin Research Products).(21) A bottle of 90 tablets is about 25 dollars plus shipping.(21) Visit the hypothyroidism page on my web site for more thyroid related information.(22)
See David Brownstein's Book on Iodine(4), and The Iodine Group for more information.(19) Above Image Courtesy of David Brownstein MD
Jeffrey Dach, M.D.
4700 Sheridan Suite T
Hollywood Florida 33021
954-983-1443
http://jeffreydach.com
http://www.drdach.com
Visit the web site
References
(1) http://www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/opt_Research_I.shtml
Publications by Guy Abraham MD on Iodine references at Optimox.com
(2) http://www.amazon.com/Breast-Cancer-Iodine-Prevent-Survive/dp/1552128849
The book, Breast Cancer and Iodine : How to Prevent and How to Survive Breast Cancer by Dr. David Derry M.D., Ph.D.
(3) http://thyroid.about.com/library/derry/bl1a.htm
Dr. David Derry Answers Reader Questions Brought to you by Mary Shomon, Your Thyroid Guide. Discussion of Iodine as Breast Cancer Prevention
(4) http://www.drbrownstein.com/singleproduct.asp?id=787
Iodine: Why You Need It, Why You Can't Live Without It (2nd Edition) by David Brownstein MD, Book.
(5) http://www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/IOD-09/IOD_09.htm
Clinical Experience with Inorganic Non-radioactive Iodine/Iodide by David Brownstein, M.D.
(6) www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/IOD-10/IOD_10.htm
Orthoiodosupplementation in a Primary Care Practice by Jorge D. Flechas, M.D.
(7) http://www.lewrockwell.com/miller/miller20.html
Iodine for Health by Donald W. Miller, Jr., MD on Lew Rockwell Blog
(8) http://www.donaldmiller.com/Iodine%20Talk.doc
Iodine in Health and Civil Defense Presented at the 24th Annual Meeting of Doctors of Disaster Preparedness at Portland State University, August 6, 2006 by Donald W. Miller, Jr., M.D.
(9) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8979164
Int J Vitam Nutr Res. 1996;66(4):350-62. Total diet study: estimated dietary intakes of nutritional elements, 1982-1991.Pennington JA, Schoen SA. Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Washington, DC 20204, USA.
(10) http://www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/pdfs/IOD01.pdf
Optimum Levels of Iodine for Greatest Mental and Physical Health by Guy E. Abraham, MD, Jorge D. Flechas, MD, and John C. Hakala, RPh THE ORIGINAL INTERNIST September 2002 page 5. Effect of daily ingestion of a tablet containing 5 mg iodine and 7.5 mg iodide as the potassium salt, for a period of 3 months, on the results of thyroid function tests and thyroid volume by ultrasonometry in ten euthyroid Caucasian women See Table 7.
(11) http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/reprint/35/9/2332
Bernard A. Eskin et al. Rat mammary gland atypia produced by iodine blockade with perchlorate. Cancer Res. 1975 Sep;35(9):2332-9
(12) http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/reprint/46/2/877
Dietary Iodine Deficiency as a Tumor Promoter and Carcinogen in Male F344/NCr Rats Masato Ohshima and Jerrold M. Ward. Cancer Research 46, 877-883, February 1, 1986
(13) http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/353/3/229
Benign Breast Disease and the Risk of Breast Cancer. Hartmann, Lynn C. N Engl J Med Volume 353;3:229-237 July 21, 2005
(14) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8221402
Ghent,W.R., Eskin,B.A., Low,D.A., Hill, L.P.. Iodine replacement in fibrocystic disease of the breast. Can J Surg 1993; 36:453-460.
(15) http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct/show/NCT00237523?order=1
Clinical Trial for Iodine treatment of Fibrocystic Breast Disease
Study for Treatment of Moderate or Severe, Periodic, "Cyclic", Breast Pain. This study is ongoing, but not recruiting participants. Sponsored by: Symbollon Pharmaceuticals ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT00237523
(16) http://www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/opt_Iodoral.htm
Iodoral from Optimox
(17) http://www.fda.gov/cder/guidance/4825fnl.htm
Guidance on Potassium Iodide as a Thyroid Blocking Agent in Radiation Emergencies, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Food and Drug Administration, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), December 2001
(18) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/5395878
Bernecker C. Acta Allergol. 1969 Sep;24(3):216-25. Intermittent therapy with potassium iodide in chronic obstructive disease of the airways. A review of 10 years' experience.
(19) http://iodine4health.com/index.htm
The Iodine Group
(20) http://cypress.he.net/~bigmacnc/drflechas/index.htm/iodine.htm
George Flechas MD Web Site
(21) http://www.vrp.com/ProductPage.aspx?ProdID=9139&zType=1
VRP Vitamin Research Products Offers Iodoral Online, no prescription needed.
(22) http://www.drdach.com/wst_page10.html
Hypothyroidism Jeffrey Dach MD web site
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Dr. Dach is Board Certified by the American Board of Radiology and a member of the Board of the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine. He has 25 years experience in the Memorial Hospital System as an interventional radiologist. He is the founder of TrueMedMD a clinic specializing in natural medicine, natural bio-identical hormones, and natural thyroid therapies.
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You suggest Iodine supplementation for prevention of breast cancer.
I have autoimmune Hashimoto's hypothyroidism and a family history of breast cancer.
Some info says to not take iodine with Hashimoto's. What do you know?
Susan from Leominster
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Dear Susan,
This question keeps coming up.
We have a large number of patients enrolled in our clinic with Hashimoto's thyroiditis who are doing quite well on a treatment program which includes natural desiccated thyroid as well as iodine supplementation.
Iodine supplementation for Hashimoto's patients is recommended by David Brownstein MD, and George Flechas, MD.
This is discussed in the book,
Overcoming Thyroid Disorders by David Brownstein, MD
http://www.drbrownstein.com/singleproduct.asp?id=787
Here is a reveiw of the book:
http://www.townsendletter.com/Dec2002/thyroid1202.htm
warmest regards from
jeffrey dach md
www.drdach.com
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2 quick questions:
1) Is it better to take Iodoral on an empty stomach or with food?
2) Better to take Iodoral apart from other supps or ok to take it with them?
(I've seen sites that say not to take with anti-oxidants since it is an oxidant.)
KS from St Louis
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Dear KS ,
Here is the link to information on Iodoral which will answer your questions:
http://www.optimox.com/pics/Iodine/opt_Iodoral.htm
warmest regards from,
jeffrey dach md
www.drdach.com
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I wanted to get the right dosage for Iodorol iodine supplementation. Through researching, I decided to take Iodorol for my painful fibro-cystic changes in my breast every month. I am taking three tablets a day (12mg each), and I have only used them half a month and when before my cycle started I have had no cystic issues this month, and I am totally relieved!
I also seem to have symptom of low metabolism, temperature a degree below normal all the time. So I want to know if I should keep taking 3 tablets as I have been or is that too much ? Thanks for your help!
Kim From CA
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Dear Kim,
It is fantastic that your fibrocystic symptoms have been relieved.
As always, it is important to work closely with a knowledgable physician who can monitor your thyroid function. At the upper left on the sidebar, click on the links for "Find A Doctor" for a directory of doctors in your area.
warmest regards,
Jeffrey Dach MD
www.drdach.com
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Dear Dr. Dach,
Do you have any information regarding the use iodine supplemenation in someone who has a history of aggressive thyroid cancer. My wife had a papillary (follicular variant) thyroid cancer diagnosed in 1996. She went through a thyroidectomy followed by 6-7 years of repeated I131 radiation treatment because of persistently positive lymph nodes in her neck. She eventually had a radical neck dissection in 2001 removing the last 9 positive nodes and has had negative PET scans and neg thyroglobulin ever since. Her TSH remains suppresed on synthroid + cytomel.
My question pertains to the fact that she has fibrocystic breasts and a strong family history of breast cancer. Her 24 hr urine hormone analysis shows that she has excessive ammounts of estrone (despite being premenopausal) but her 2OH:16OH ratio is high (~8) - which is good and probably because she is on DIM/I3C and eats lots of cruciferous veggies. Dr. Jonathan Wright recommends placing her on iodine to help convert her estrone to estriol. This is concerning to me because I fear that any iodine supplementation will feed any micrometastic thryoid cancer that may be hiding. Do you have any thoughts on this and any research to help me make a decision? She recently found a breast lump that has made these concerns more immediate. Diet, Vit D, omega-3, and other nutritional aspects are excellent. Thank you.
James L from Florida
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Dear James,
Thanks for your email.
In general terms,the use of radio-active Iodine treatment for thyroid cancer is one of the treatments I administered as a radiologist working in the hospital for 25 years, and the results were usually very good for the patients we treated with radioactive Iodine back in those days.
For your question about the use of non-radioactive Iodine as a supplement after radio-active iodine ablation of the thyroid, or with a history thyroid of thyroid cancer, I don’t have a good answer to that question. Sorry about that.
We all get about 150 micrograms a day of Iodine in table salt which is the RDA for iodine. However, I do not have any information about the effect of larger amounts of Iodine supplements on the natural history of thyroid cancer.
The two experts in the country on Iodine are David Brownstein MD in Michigan and George Flechas, MD. They would be able to answer your question. Dr Jonathan Wright of course has my highest regards, also David Perlmutter MD in Naples is highly regarded.
The following is a link to a case report of an individual treated by Dr George Flechas. This patient had thyroid cancer treated with surgery and radioactive iodine, and was later treated with 75 mg of Iodine per day with improvement in insulin resistant adult onset diabetes. Apparently the iodine was benefical in reversing the diabetes.
Dr. Flechas' first course of action was to begin a series of tests to diagnose the thyroid nodule. He was also started on medicines to control his diabetes and high blood pressure. A ultrasound of his thyroid was performed in the office and revealed that the nodule was solid. He then sent him for a thyroid uptake nuclear scan. The test revealed that the nodule was "cold". A "cold" nodule is an indicator that the nodule could be malignant. The next was a fine needle biopsy of the nodule. The biopsy was inconclusive saying that the nodule could neither be defined as malignant or benign. After much discussion between three doctors including Dr. Flechas, an encrinologist, and a ENT, it was decided that Mack would have surgery to remove the nodule. During the surgery the nodule was sent directly to pathology and it was discovered to be Papillary Thyroid Cancer and the decision was made to go ahead and remove all of Mack's thyroid.
After Mack had recovered from the surgery, he was then sent back into the hospital for a radioactive iodine treatment to kill any remaining thyroid tissue that may be in his body.
When the course of treatment for his thyroid cancer was completed, Dr. Flechas started Mack on Iodoral - 3 tablets in the morning and 3 tablets at night. Since starting the Iodoral, Mack's diabetes had almost completely disappeared. He is no longer on diabetes' medicines and his blood sugars have been in the normal range for over a year.
Update April, 2005: Mack is now down to 240 lbs after starting at a weight of about 320 lbs when first starting treatment with Dr. Flechas. His overall general health is wonderful. He is sleeping well for the first time in years and very active. Quoted directly from Dr Flechas' Web Site.
Contact information for Flechas and Brownstein:
Jorge D. Flechas, M.D.
#80 Doctors Drive Suite 3
Hendersonville, NC 28792
Office: (828) 684-3233
Fax: (828) 684-3253
Email: ffplabnc@msn.com
Dr. Brownstein's office is:
The Center for Holistic Medicine
5821 W. Maple Rd., Ste. 192
West Bloomfield, MI 48322
tel: (248) 851-1600
Warmest Regards from,
Jeffrey Dach, M.D.
Medical Director of TrueMedMD
4700 Sheridan, Suite T
Hollywood, Florida 33021
954 983 1443 office
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I have a pattern of hyperthyroidism. I have been previously told to stay away from iodine. Now I'm hearing I possibly may be deficient in iodine. What is your opinion and how much would you suggest I take per day?
Diane
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