Would you explain the scientific rational for removing heavy metals from the body and your particular process for heavy metal detoxification?  

I mentioned earlier that when metals ionize they have a positive charge, so a strategy for capturing them might include creating molecules that carry a negative charge. I also noted, since heavy metals, other than aluminum, tend to bind to sulfur, another way to capture them is to create molecules that have a lot of closely packed sulfur groups. One molecule that naturally occurs in our body, alpha lipoic acid, is a component of several important enzymes and it has the closely arranged dual sulfur configuration I refer to. Additionally, the heavy metal binding protein I mentioned earlier is called metallothionain and it has a sulfated amino acid at every third position.  So to summarize, molecular structures that have multiple negative charges or have multiple near-by sulfur residues are good ways to either electro-statically or covalently bind to heavy metals. The electro-static binding agent I use most frequently is called Ethylene Diamine Tetra Acetate – EDTA for short – it has two groups of two minus one charges which totals to four minus charges and these allow one EDTA to bind up to two plus two charged heavy metals. EDTA can be given orally and intravenously. If you are unaware that EDTA is found in most processed foods, it should come as no surprise that EDTA is there for binding heavy metal contaminants that could potentially oxidize or spoil the food and thereby limit shelf life. Every lavender rubber topped tube of blood used to measure your hematology parameters contains EDTA to bind calcium and prevent blood from clotting. Patients are concerned that I am giving a calcium binding agent like EDTA orally or IV, but it is important to understand the reactions of this agent are purely based on physical chemistry. Since the binding affinity of EDTA for heavy metals is much higher than for calcium, the calcium is readily exchanged in favor of heavy metals. Once bound; the EDTA-heavy metal complex is excreted unchanged in the urine. Since EDTA is a very negatively charged molecule, it is unable to cross the lipid cellular membrane and therefore prevented from accessing intra-cellular heavy metals. Since inside of the cell is in equilibrium with the extra-cellular space, as EDTA clears the extra-cellular metals, the intracellular metals slowly release to the outside and become available for binding.

Chelation from the Greek word claw, is a well know chemistry term that denotes an electrostatic binding or attraction between two oppositely charge species. EDTA was originally synthesized in 1932 by a German chemist working in the textile dye industry. Color dyes applied to fabrics tend to bind unevenly with calcium in the medium and EDTA was designed to clear the calcium for a more uniform uptake of the dye. It quickly became obvious the EDTA was even more attracted to heavy metals than calcium, so it had even broader applications as a heavy metal detox agent. In Detroit during the early 50s there was a large explosion in a battery factory where many workers were exposed to toxic lead and other volatile metals. IV EDTA was given to these workers and they rapidly improved. Several of these patients were also cardiac patients and they told their cardiologist, Dr Norman Clark, that their chest pains or angina had totally resolved after taking the EDTA containing injections. Dr Clark was so intrigued by this, that he began using IV EDTA in other cardiac patients with angina and noted the same beneficial results. Dr Clark was convinced that EDTA was literally stripping calcium from atherosclerotic plaque in the coronary arteries of his patients and he attributed their improvement to this effect. We now know this is not the primary effect of EDTA. Instead, binding heavy metals, and in particular with respect to vascular disease, binding cadmium and removing it from the body is thought to be the chief mechanism for the improvement that patients report. Of all heavy metals, cadmium is the most toxic to the endothelial lining of the arteries and particularly at the bifurcation or branch points of major arteries. Since plaqueing of the arteries is not a uniform process, but rather tends to occur at branch points it was assumed for many years that arterial injury and subsequent attempts by the body to repair the injury with a cholesterol/calcium patch was exclusively due to baro-trauma, i.e. the injury at branch points was a consequence of re-enforced pulse waves of blood crashing up against the vascular wall at these locations. Recent histo-chemical studies have provided us with another equally pathogenic explanation. It turns out that artery branch points contain much higher concentrations of sulfated amino sugars in their glycosaminoglycan supportive structures. These serve as a molecular magnet for cadmium and this accumulation starts the oxidative-inflammatory cascade of events leading to excess injury and plaque build up in these areas. I mentioned earlier the particular neurotoxic effect of mercury.  Cadmium, however, is much more toxic to the arterial lining and in particular the sub-endothelial space where higher concentrations of sulfated amino sugars exist.  This explains why smokers have higher vulnerability to vascular disease since they receive a double dose of cadmium from the combustion of both the paper and the tobacco. Also, bear in mind most tobacco crops are sprayed with cadmium containing fungicides.

Now turning to the issue of my particular process, I was initially trained in metal toxicology and heavy metal detoxification techniques by the American College for the Advancement of Medicine (ACAM) in 1995. Each physician trained by ACAM will adapt these precepts for safe delivery of chelation agents to their own unique practice situation. Over the years, by combining my detox therapies with bio-energetic testing, I have settled on a regimen of giving chelation treatments no closer together than every two weeks. On the initial and all subsequent visits, I test for markers of extra-cellular heavy metal burden and suspend treatment when the burden falls below a certain level. Over time, intracellular metals equilibrate with the extracellular component and if the heavy metal burden reaches threshold, I recommend more chelation to bring it down. I have found that by adding injectable homeopathics to the IV Drip, targeting the chelation agent to organs, tissues and glands with the highest metal burden, optimizes the treatment.  Understand, along with the IV chelation I am also recommending oral supplements, such as EDTA, to lower the body’s heavy metal burden by improving the efficiency of detox organs, liver, bowel and kidneys. Also, bear in mind that good minerals crowd out toxic metals, so my supplementation with multiple mineral formulas is substantial. Concurrent with each chelation IV, I administer a foot bath which exposes the feet to an electrode alternating between positive and negative polarity over twenty four minutes. Patients are always impressed by the dirty brown color of the water, but that comes from the electrodes and would be there even in the absence of feet. What I have people notice is the amount of slime on the water surface by the end of the treatment. This substance is toxic waste and does not derive from the electrodes. Note that when the electrode is in a positive polarity, toxins bearing a negative charge will be released into the water. The opposite occurs with the opposite polarity. These modalities, used in combination give me the biggest yield of toxic metals with virtually no side effects. Some chelation clinics give such heavy doses and repeat IVs in such short intervals that they are forced to give an IV of minerals about every fourth injection because patients become mineral depleted otherwise. Recall, chelation dose must match the body burden of metal to be extracted. If chelation is too aggressive with high doses given at frequent intervals, the chelation agent will bind physiologic trace minerals, e.g. zinc, copper, manganese, selenium, molybdenum, etc. and patients complaints will increase correspondingly. Adjusting the dose commensurate with heavy metal burden on each visit obviates patient discomfort while optimizing metal yield.

 I hope this explanation of the heavy metal problem, the rationale for its treatment and a review of my own particular process has been helpful. For those of you who undergo IV chelation therapy at our clinic, we offer an optional test through Doctor’s Data in Chicago whereby a sample of your urine from a 6 hour collection following the chelation can be submitted and measured for heavy metal levels.