Cited by 49Thyroid Disorders and TreatmentsThyroid and Parathyroid SurgeryThyroid Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment

Current evidence for the treatment of hypothyroidism with levothyroxine/levotriiodothyronine combination therapy versus levothyroxine monotherapy

Open access
Hennessey, James V., Espaillat, Ramon·2018·International Journal of Clinical Practice

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Hypothyroidism is relatively common, occurring in approximately 5% of the general US population aged ≥12 years. Levothyroxine (LT4) monotherapy is the standard of care. Approximately, 5%-10% of patients who normalise thyroid-stimulating hormone levels with LT4 monotherapy may have persistent symptoms that patients and clinicians may attribute to hypothyroidism. A long-standing debate in the literature is whether addition of levotriiodothyronine (LT3) to LT4 will ameliorate lingering symptoms. Here, we explore the evidence for and against LT4/LT3 combination therapy as the optimal approach to treat euthyroid patients with persistent complaints. METHODS: Recent literature indexed on PubMed was searched in March 2017 using the terms "hypothyroid" or "hypothyroidism" and "triiodothyronine combination" or "T3 combination." Relevant non-review articles published in English during the past 10 years were included and supplemented with articles already known to the authors. FINDINGS: Current clinical evidence is not sufficiently strong to support LT4/LT3 combination therapy in patients with hypothyroidism. Polymorphisms in deiodinase genes that encode the enzymes that convert T4 to T3 in the periphery may provide potential mechanisms underlying unsatisfactory treatment results with LT4 monotherapy. However, results of studies on the effect of LT4/LT3 therapy on clinical symptoms and thyroid-responsive genes have thus far not been conclusive. CONCLUSIONS: Persistent symptoms in patients who are biochemically euthyroid with LT4 monotherapy may be caused by several other conditions unrelated to thyroid function, and their cause should be aggressively investigated by the clinician.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1111/ijcp.13062

Cites

73 of 73 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • There is currently no accepted role for the use of LT3 in the management of hypothyroidism.

    “there is currently no accepted role for the use of LT3 in the management of hypothyroidism”

    From Pharmacodynamic and Therapeutic Actions of Levothyroxine (2021) · cites this paper as [135]

  • Loss-of-function polymorphisms in deiodinases have been proposed to contribute to failure of thyrotropin-guided LT4 therapy to completely abolish symptoms of hypothyroidism in some patients, due to insufficient provision of T3.

    “Loss-of-function polymorphisms in deiodinases have been proposed to contribute to failure of thyrotropin-guided LT4 therapy to completely abolish symptoms of hypothyroidism in some patients, due to insufficient provision of T3”

    From Pharmacodynamic and Therapeutic Actions of Levothyroxine (2021) · cites this paper as [135]

  • Results of trials comparing LT4-LT3 combinations with LT4 monotherapy, or meta-analyses of these trials, have been inconsistent, without demonstrating convincing or consistent benefit for combination therapy.

    “The results of trials comparing LT4-LT3 combinations with LT4 monotherapy, or meta-analyses of these trials, have been inconsistent, without demonstrating convincing or consistent benefit for combination therapy”

    From Pharmacodynamic and Therapeutic Actions of Levothyroxine (2021) · cites this paper as [135]

  • Loss-of-function polymorphisms in deiodinases have stimulated interest in LT4-levotriiodothyronine combination therapy, or thyroid extracts, in patients with hypothyroidism.

    “This has stimulated interest (and use to this day) in LT4-levotriiodothyronine (liothyronine, LT3) combination therapy, or thyroid extracts (which are not supported by any guidelines), in these patients”

    From Pharmacodynamic and Therapeutic Actions of Levothyroxine (2021) · cites this paper as [135]

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 1

  1. [49]Levitt JA, Silverberg J. T4 plus T3 for hypothyroidism: a double‐blind comparison with usual T4. Los Angeles, CA: Proceedings of the 74th Annual Meeting of the American Thyroid Association; 2002.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Hennessey, J. V., & Espaillat, R.
Affiliations
  • Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (US)
  • AbbVie (United States) (US)
Corresponding author
Hennessey, James V.
Venue
International Journal of Clinical Practice
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2018-01-30
Volume
72
Issue
2
Pages
e13062
ISSN
1368-5031 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2791861988
Cited by
49
References
73
Citations by year
2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 11 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 5
FWCI
5.57
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • International Journal of Clinical Practice (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
AbbVie
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism › Thyroid Disorders and Treatments
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Surgery › Thyroid and Parathyroid Surgery
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism › Thyroid Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment
Keywords
hypothyroidism, levothyroxine, combination thyroid hormone therapy, thyroid-stimulating hormone
MeSH terms
Drug Therapy, Combination, Humans, Hypothyroidism, Thyroxine, Triiodothyronine

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review