I had finally got my GP to mark my prescriptions as TEVA brand only. One small win, only to find my pharmacy has been unsuccessful getting it from their suppliers. Apparently it’s out of stock.
I had a conversation with the pharmacist who tried to tell me that Accord (which I’m currently taking) are the same as TEVA. I put him straight and told him the ingredients are different. TEVA contains mannitol and no lactose and Accord contains lactose and no mannitol. He proceeded to talk over me and not let me finish. I’m quite angry now and will from now on not take any more sh*t from these so called medical professionals.
Thankfully there was a very helpful female pharmacy assistant who said she will call their supplier on Monday and speak to them and get back to me. She gave me an alternative brand Almus. Only to find out when I got home they are just Accord packaged as Almus. 🙄
Anyway, silver lining is I now have extra Levo to start increasing my dose to 75mcgs myself.
Still waiting for medichecks thyroid function and full iron blood tests to come through. Once I have those results back I want to send an email to my GP and ‘educate’ them on why I need an increase in Levo and that I want to put a plan in place to continue increasing regularly until I get to an optimal dose. I’ve felt so tired and beaten down by the medical profession but now I’m feeling really determined and motivated!
Any tips on how I should go about this email and on how I can get hold of TEVA, would be gratefully received.
Have a great weekend 🎄
Written by
MsWhistledown
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That is one of many reasons I produced by medicines documents!
The UK one has a nice little table showing which medicines are the same as each other! And the excipients which seem most problematical.
helvella's medicines documents (UK and Rest of the World) can be found here:
helvella - Thyroid Hormone Medicines
helvella has created, and tries to maintain, documents containing details of all thyroid hormone medicines in the UK and, in less detail, many others around the world.
This link takes you to a page which has direct links to the documents from Dropbox and Google Drive, and QR codes to make it easy to access from phones.
The UK document contains up-to-date versions of the Summary Matrix for tablets, oral solutions and liothyronine available in the UK.
I was told by my usual pharmacist that Teva was out of stock but after phoning round a few other pharmacies I found one that said they had loads of Teva so if you its possible for you to do that you might be lucky
Bigger Tescos with a pharmacy may have it. It just depends on what they've been sent.
The pharmacy attached to my local surgery is able to order brands which they haven't got in stock. Really helpful as I'm trying to find a brand which agrees with me.
You have to use the independent pharmacist as they can order brands. The ones like boots, Internet chemist and online ones will fob you off with whatever they have and it doesn't matter what it says on you perscription. Hope this helps.
I also can only tolerate Teva and have had similar problems. Think we are unusual. I now use the GP dispensary and they usually get it right but not always. Don't think there is a supply problem. They have just given me 3 months supply of the 50 mcg dose as I will be abroad for a while.
If your surgery has a dispensary why not try them? I think they benefit financially.
My pharmacist keeps giving me Teva and I keep returning it. I'm currently cutting 100s in half until I can get something else. Pity we can't operate a swap shop on here! 🤔
Apparently this supply problem pharmacists keep experiencing is due to Brexit. I am truly tired of it.
To think that a few years ago (and for many years) I could get my prescription sent to my local pharmacy in the knowledge that bar a specific issue, there would always be a range of brands to choose from and Teva, Almus, Advanz, Mercury Pharm, Northstar etc would be staples, and if wasn't available you just get an order put through, and now I have had to go back to paper prescriptions and play 'find the missing levo' with every pharmacist in the area, some of whom refuse to accept that you have a genuine need for a different brand. It's ridiculous and tiring on bad days. And yes Teva seems to becoming difficult to get hold of which I'm surprised about. Accord is everywhere and plentiful it seems. I like Accord, but not the giant welts it gives me.
It seems we have to battle so many fronts to try to find a way to feel well. I too have had ‘conversations’ with my pharmacist but stood my ground.
They accepted my position and telephoned around for Teva. I now receive it every month without issue and collected a prescription only last Friday so it appears not to be out of stock everywhere, if the correct suppliers are contacted.
The cynic in me feels the cost may be one of the salient factors.
I request Teva Codeine, because it seems to 'work' better for me than others, even though it's supposed to be the same.I'd love to order more than I need to stock up. Teva is an Israeli brand, so there may be shortages.
Pharmacies need to realise that some of us react more sensitively and our bodies can tell the difference between minute ingredients and binders.
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