too much levothyroxine

[amym84]

hi! I accidentally took an extra 100mg of levothyroxine this morning on top of my usual 50. I mistook them for some other meds. should I be worried?? I googled it and it says overdoses can lead to palpitations come heart attacks and death 🙈

[SeasideSusie Remembering]

Amy

Don't worry, you're not going to peg out yet!

Just leave off your Levo for the next 2 days, then restart at 50mcg, that will put you back on track.

Some people have their Levo given to them in one weekly dose, so you will be fine.

[amym84 in reply to SeasideSusie]

thanks so much!!!!

[bantam12]

You will be fine, a one off isn't an overdose.

[amym84 in reply to bantam12]

thankyou!!

[greygoose]

No, I shouldn't worry, if I were you. Yesterday, I accidentally took an extra 25 mcg T3, and didn't notice a thing! It was only this morning that I noticed what I'd done. And T3 is much faster acting than T4.

[amym84 in reply to greygoose]

thanks very much!!!

[greygoose in reply to amym84]

You're welcome.

[cynthialj]

You should be fine. That’s not a lot and it’s not T3. Don’t worry.

[helvella Administrator]

The subject of taking too much levothyroxine as an acute event (e.g. two tablets instead of one for one day) has been discussed many times. This is a link to one such discussion thread:

healthunlocked.com/thyroidu...

[This is already on the thread linked above.] This is a case where someone who really, really should have known better misunderstood dosing altogether:

amjmed.com/article/S0002-93...

This is a brief summary of the effects (or lack of them) in several older patients:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/268...

Always be careful - with all medicines - but levothyroxine is one of the absolute safest on the planet. Far safer than common over-the-counter products such as aspirin and paracetamol.