People keep writing to me to report that they are still not able to get prescriptions for Thyrolar and Armour refilled at certain pharmacies. So I checked in with the folks at Forest Pharmaceuticals to find out the status on the availability of the proucts, and found out the following information...

As of mid-July, according to Forest, shortages of Thyrolar may persist through September 2004 for all dosage strengths of Thyrolar. The company states that the shortages are due to temporary manufacturing process changes that are taking longer to implement than the company had anticipated, and are not the result of product safety issues. Thyrolar has NOT been recalled, and the company is not stopping the production and distribution of the product.

There are still some back-orders for Armour Thyroid in some dosages (mainly larger size strengths) but these are fairly short back-orders that should ship quickly. Most of the smaller strengths of Armour are not on back-order, so you should be able to get those dosages without any delays. (One thing I suggest: Consider asking your physician or pharmacist if they can substitute smaller dosage pills if they can't fill a prescription for larger size pills. For example, if you take 1 grain of Armour per day, you can also take 4 of the 1/4 grain tablets.)

It's probably going to be the Fall before Thyrolar is fully available.

If you need an equivalency chart that shows how to convert Armour® Thyroid to Thyrolar to Levothyroxine (like Unithroid , Levoxyl, Levothroid, or Synthroid) see the online conversion chart online.