People who are dumb enough to blindly follow the Big Black Woman on TV are society's self correcting problems.

With over 400,000 deaths a year caused by hospital error. It's a shame Doctors give medical advise.

I used to admire Oprah Winfrey, and in some ways I still do. Her support of education for girls for example, her huge charitable works, her promotion of things like family dinners and the idea of women's health. I say 'the idea', though, because while I think she is in good faith - the thought did occur to me to wonder if she gets any kind of financial kickback for these promotions - but overall I believe she is in good faith, she is also good and ignorant about so many impotrant topics.

Dr Phil for example - the things she has allowed him to do on her show are tantamount, in my book, to abuse. Oprah is such a huge self help evangeliser, and yet, to my absolute astonishment, says she has never had therapy. Therefore, she wouldn't know what a good therapist was like, and so that must be how she ended up with Dr Phil who, in my book, should have stayed creating juries or whatever it was he used to do with his psychology degree before he decided to try out clinical practise on a nationwide show.

To the topic at hand: this is dangerous. I agree with the author that this is an important topic - womens health as tehy age - and one taht has been neglected by medical science. What science doesn't know about women and hormones would fill a set of encyclopedias. Women are desperately in need of strong medical and other support. But Oprah isn't providing that. By having an actress like Suzanne Somers on her show she's turning this into just another gimmick. A whole lot of women will stump up for all these products, apply them until tehy can't afford them or are bored and then sink back into the reasons they were trying this out in the first place. It's not helpful. It's just another gimmick.

Oprah often to me ssems like the biggest victim of her own gullibility and penchant for fads and crazes. She's always sitting there with her mouth open just swallowing whatever dman fool thing someone says to her.

Oprah! You're an intelligent woman! Why doesn't she stop being such a star struck amateuir about all these things adn actually seek out and listen to authentic experts? And of course tehy don't always have to be doctors. They couldn't alwyas be becuase of course there are experts who aren't qualified in that field. But there needs to be some notion of responsibility on her show because otherwise she is just dangerous, and picking on one of the most vulnerable groups in America - her audience, women.

She shilled for the Iraq war and the Wall Street bailout.

She doesn't give a crap for the little people, she IS a corporation.

Thank you so very much for posting this and especially for mentioning Oprah's show on thyroid disease. I was disgusted when I heard Oprah tell her audience how her thyroid disease was cured by going off the replacement hormone Synthroid, jetting off to Hawaii and eating nothing but fresh vegetables, fruit, and processed soy products, which, by the way, is a known goitrogen (interferes with thyroid function). While Synthroid is not the answer for everyone, there are many other kinds of thyroid replacement hormones that will also get the job done. The bottom line is, once you are diagnosed hypothyroid, you MUST be on replacement hormones or you will suffer horribly and eventually end up in a coma. You can die from being hypothyroid if it goes on long enough.

Dr. Northrup is a crackpot and if she is, in fact, treating Oprah's thyroid condition, she should be sued for malpractice. It doesn't take an MD to see where Oprah's dramatic weight gain has come from. Often you can also see the "thyroid bloat" in her face and especially around her eyes.

It blows my mind that Oprah can be one of the richest women in the world and be surrounded by doctors who don't know the basic principles of treating thyroid disease. There is absolutely no excuse for it. She can hire anyone she wants unlike those of us who are "lucky" enough to have an HMO but perhaps, that is the problem.

DNRTFA.

Lay off the happy pills. SSRIs are fluoride compounds. Fluoride is toxic to the thyroid. Weight gain and decreased libido due to SSRIs are a direct result of the toxic effects on the thyroid gland.

Don't expect the AMA to spread that fact around either.

Wow, this is very disheartening. I don't watch Oprah, but I've always liked her, always thought her intentions were good, and I know she has a background in journalism. This kind of stuff is inexcusable, because she knows how much influence she has. I did begin to question her judgment after watching one episode of "Dr. Phil," because it's so obvious he's just a charlatan, spewing meaningless crap meant to shame and bully people; he's only helping himself get rich, usually at a gullible person's expense. You can see Oprah's powerful influence by his success despite the fact that he's a fake. I mean, he wrote a successful diet book. Who buys a diet book from an overweight man? But people did.

Chicken Rangoon, that characterization of Oprah was insulting, unnecessary, and added nothing of value to this discussion. Please don't use such language here.

Doctors are just as ignorant as anyone else. I have never dealt with a docotr who knew more about general medicine than myself and find myself correcting them and educating them more often than not. I don't have a medical degree so I have to look things up and read about it and they do not.

Doctors are about as reliable as a car mechanic except they are much more likely to mess you up than a car mechanic. They also will walk down the hall in a hospital stick their head in the door, ask you how you are doing and charge you hundreds of dollars for that medical treatment. They also will replace or remove parts that don't need replacing or removing and charge you for work they didn't do and you didn't need in the first place.

They killed both of my parents and my brother.

Nothing illegal about it either.

It's all about the money - that is what drives people into the profession. Helping people is the last thing on most of their minds. They will write you a script for antidepressants at the drop of a hat because then they know you will keep coming back for more and increase their income.

I know there must be good doctors - I see plenty of them on TV.