The Jod-Basedow effect (also Jod-Basedow syndrome and Jod-Basedow phenomenon) is hyperthyroidism following administration of iodine or iodide, either as a dietary supplement or as contrast medium.
This phenomenon is thus iodine-induced hyperthyroidism, typically presenting in a patient with endemic goiter (due to iodine deficiency), who relocate to an iodine-abundant geographical area. People who have Grave′s disease, toxic multinodular goiter, or various types of thyroid adenoma are also at risk of Jod-Basedow effect when they ingest extra iodine. The Jod-Basedow effect also been seen as a side effect of administration of the iodine-containing contast agents, or amiodarone, an antiarrhythmic drug. The Jod-Basedow effect does not occur in persons with normal thyroid glands who ingest extra iodine in any form.
The Jod-Basedow effect is named for the German word for iodine, "Jod" (which is a capitalized noun in German), plus the name of Karl Adolph von Basedow, a German physician who first described the effect.
The Jod-Basedow effect typically occurs with comparitively small increases in iodine intake, in people who have thryoid abnormalities that cause the gland to function without the control of the pituitary (i.e., a thyroid gland that is not normally suppressed by thyroid hormone driven loss of TSH secretion from the pituitary). In some ways the Jod-Basedow phenomenon is the opposite of the Wolff-Chaikoff effect, which refers to the short period of thyroid-hormone suppression which happens in normal persons and in persons with thyroid disease, when comparitivesly large quantities of iodine or iodide are ingested. However, unlike the Wolff-Chaikoff effect, the Jod-Basedow effect does not occur in persons with normal thyroid glands, as thyroid hormone synthesis and release in normal persons is controlled by pituitary TSH secretion, which does not allow hyperhyroidism when extra iodine is ingested.
The Jod-Basedow phenomenon is differentiated from Basedow's disease, which is occasionally used as a synonym for Grave's disease.
Famous quotes containing the word phenomenon:
“When the ice is covered with snow, I do not suspect the wealth under my feet; that there is as good as a mine under me wherever I go. How many pickerel are poised on easy fin fathoms below the loaded wain! The revolution of the seasons must be a curious phenomenon to them. At length the sun and wind brush aside their curtain, and they see the heavens again.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)