Posted by bleauberry on April 23, 2009, at 19:17:41
In reply to Radioactive, posted by Sigismund on April 21, 2009, at 18:18:15
This topic is much too complicated to discuss here. For the answers to all your questions and many you will have, here are the answers..."Amalgam Illness", book by Phd Andrew Cutler, available on the web.
My opinion is the hair test is a definite red flag that warrants immediate attention.
What is a "normal" amount of heavy metals? Doesn't matter. Even miniscule amounts can cause profound illness depending on how compromised one's genes or immune system are. Some people excrete normally, others accumulate.
My urine mercury and lead were "normal", but present. Here is the important part. After a one time dose of DMSA 1200mg, the following 6 hours showed a 500% increase of both metals, well into the danger zone. That was just a hint of metals stored in tissues, not to mention the nervous system.
The metals are not floating in blood unless recent exposure. They embed into tissues and bones and hair.
Hair tests are tricky. They can show outright toxicity, as yours appears to. They can also show strange patterns that do not appear toxic, yet are. Basically, when essential metals are scattered all over the map in erroneous patterns, some real high, some real low, or missing completely, those are suspicious signs since mercury displaces other metals.
My first hair test showed toxicity. I did nothing about it, and got sicker. Two years later, very little lead, very little mercury, and practically zero of any essential metals in a repeat hair test. Mercury had so thoroughly displaced everything they weren't even getting into hair anymore. The urine test proved they were in high concentrations despite nothing in the hair.
Ways to make a diagnosis:
1. Hair test as a hint, low dose frequent dose DMSA as a test (if you feel worse, you are almost surely toxic).
2. DMSA urine provocation test risky: Collect baseline urine, take 1200mg DMSA, collect urine for 6 hours, measure metals in urine. The one-time large dose can stir up more metals than can be removed, causing redistribution. I made this mistake and it took me 3 weeks to recover from the fatigue and brain fog. But, it showed definite toxicity beyond what any of us had imagined.
3. DMSA urine provocation test safer: DMSA 12.5mg-25mg every 4 hours around the clock (in respect of its halflife and a steady blood level) for 2 days, collect urine, then 1200mg dose, collect urine, continue with low dose DMSA every 4 hours for 2 or 3 more days to help mop up. Measure both urine samples.
4. Intuition. People often just know. Their bizarre symptoms and patterns are not explained by anything else.
5. Patterns of metals in hair.
6. FDA urine test that measures genetic damage done by heavy metals, though it doesn't necessarily pinpoint the exact metal that did it or when it was done.
7. A history of amalgam fillings or known exposure to mercury or lead is enough to cause many people to begin low dose frequent dose chelation without any testing.
8. Several abnormalities, high normals, low normals, out-of-ranges, in routine physical and lab tests.Try to think of where exposure came from. Amalgams? Water source? Live near a factory? Downstream by air or water from an industry or polluted country? Excessive fish consumption? Other? Or was it normal exposure in a toxic world but you do not have the genetics to excrete it?
The topic really is not all that easy to cover here. You really need to read Amalgam Illness. It can be read in one evening, and then repeat the parts that seem to fit you. Anyone who suspects they might be toxic, but they don't order this book, well, that's a dangerous road.
I'm not sure of the other metals you show. I would be most concerned with the mercury and lead. Your primary friends may become DMSA and ALA (alpha lipoic acid). DMSA to begin with, ALA added later. The "whys" are explained in the book. But it has to be done in very low doses, every 4 hours, in stop-and-go rounds for several months or sometimes even a couple years. Absolutely do not do IV chelation, high dose chelation, or any herbal chelators.
What can you do right now? Be sure your drinking water is only pure filtered water and lots of it (can you get a filter put on your kitchen sink?) Lots of organic veggies and fruits. Remove all amalgams. Take supplements of Vit C, Selenium, and Zinc, either with or without other vitamins and minerals. Those 3 help to bind and tame down the toxins.
Was the lab accurate? Well, a quick low dose DMSA protocol would tell you for sure. When someone is toxic and they begin chelation, it usually feels bad. DMSA otherwise in a nontoxic person is not much more than a sugar pill, doesn't do anything. You could get the test from a second lab.
To me, that hair test of yours is highly significant. Regardless of the lab's normal ranges, methods of measurement, or errors in the measurements, the test shows something is way out of bounds. Labs make errors, but not to that extreme. Do you shower everyday? If so, any of those metals that came from the air would have been mostly washed away. Any town with that amount of stuff in the air would be filled with sick people.
The three key points I can tell you in this post are:
1. Yes, the hair test is highly significant and highly suspicious deserving a close look.
2. You are powerless to do anything about it without the book Amalgam Illness. The book is about silver filling poisoning, but applies no matter where the mercury and lead came from.
3. Time is important. The faster you act to learn more, confirm it, rule it out, or begin treatment, the better.DMSA can be ordered from VitaminResearch Products as an over-the-counter supplement. You can empty the capsules to make custom smaller doses. ALA is an over the counter supplement. Since most doctors are not trained on this topic, most patients take charge of their own treatment, since in fact it is actually very simple, cheap, and safe when done properly. Most people do chelation on a "hunch" they are toxic, as the situation sure looks that way, but never have definitive proof until they measure what is coming out in their urine a few months into treatment, when a great deal is being dumped.
poster:bleauberry
thread:891989
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20090416/msgs/892409.html