Download Chelation

Chelation: a treatment with a track
record
Published
3/10/2005
In a recent edition of IMN (29/8/05), there are three articles which
touch on the subject of chelation. There is quite an amount of
misinformation about this excellent treatment. Many agents referred to
as chelating agents are in fact not chelating agents, but provide their
benefits via their antioxidant properties.
Irish Medical News
A chelating agent is a substance that grasps heavy metals and
removes them from the body via the kidneys. This can be
demonstrated, and the toxic metals identified, by performing a urinary
metals challenge test. The test is done by administering the chelating
agent, collecting a timed urine sample, and measuring and identifying
toxic metals excreted.
In one of the articles, Dr Caroline Ward referred to lipoic acid and
sulphur colloidal in chelating therapy. Neither of these are chelating
agents. Lipoic acid is primarily an antioxidant with minimal chelating
properties. It inhibits the oxidation of heavy metals, thereby preventing
the formation of free radicals. It is these free radicals that damage
cells and are believed to be a major factor in the chronic degenerative
diseases. Colloidal silver, used by some in the treatment of autism, is
a suspension of silver that kills almost all micro-intestinal organisms,
but it also kills beneficial organisms. It is in itself a heavy metal, and
as such is toxic. Generally, its use is not recommended.
Likewise, many of the vitamins and trace elements are referred to as
chelation agents which they are not. While vitamin C in large doses
has some chelating properties, it mainly acts via its antioxidant effect.
Certain herbs such as chlorella have very weak chelating properties.
Vitamins A,C, E, and selenium together with N Acetyl cysteine and
alpha-lipoic acid are essential for the manufacture of glutathione, the
most abundant antioxidant in the body. These nutrients and
antioxidants are used as adjuncts in the chelation process but of
themselves are not chelating agents.
The two most widely used and effective chelating agents are
intravenous EDTA and oral DMSA. EDTA is used intravenously in the
treatment of adults and is particularly effective in the treatment of
heart disease, circulatory disorders and the chronic degenerative
diseases.
It was recently reported in the lay press that intravenous EDTA may
have been responsible for the death of a five-year-old autistic child in
Pittsburgh, US. While the cause of death has yet to be established, it
is important to understand that intravenous EDTA has no role to play
in the treatment of autism at this time. While intravenous EDTA is an
excellent chelator of toxic metals such as aluminium, antimony,
arsenic, cadmium, lead, uranium, silver, tin etc., as well as excess
iron and copper, it is a weak chelator of mercury.
In autism, mercury is believed to be the main offending agent.
Concerns over rising levels of mercury are dealt with by Dr John
Fleetwood in his excellent article, The impact of rising mercury levels
(IMN, 29/8/05).
In the case in Pittsburgh, the question must be asked: “Was EDTA
given according to established protocol?” Neither of the main
proponents of chelation therapy, ACAM (The American College for
Advancement in Medicine) or the IBCT (International Board Of
Chelation Therapists) would condone its use in the treatment of a fiveyear-old autistic child without following established guidelines.
According to the recommended ACAM protocol, millions of chelations
have been performed over the last 30 years with no recorded death.
In western Canada,doctors are licensed to practise intravenous EDTA
chelation since 1997, provided they prove themselves familiar with,
and follow the protocol of, ACAM. Despite strict reporting guidelines,
no serious adverse effects have been seen.
The NIH in the US is presently conducting a $30 million, five-year
clinical trial with intravenous EDTA using the ACAM protocol on 2,300
cardiac patients, with no serious adverse effects so far reported.
The NIH also estimated that 800,000 intravenous EDTA chelations
were performed in 1997 in the US alone, with no serious adverse
effects.
As it is only five per cent absorbed, EDTA is ineffective orally and in
suppository form. The oral chelators of choice are DMPS and DMSA.
Of these, the one most widely used is DMSA orally. While not as
powerful as intravenous EDTA, it does chelate heavy metals and is
effective in chelating mercury.
Where mercury is shown to be the offending agent in adults, dental
amalgams must be removed following a proper technique and a
programme followed using DMSA to detoxify the tissues. Simply
removing the dental amalgams by itself will not provide any benefit. A
good dietary regime with nutritional supplementation is also essential.
DMSA in oral form is the chelator of choice in autism, and forms part
of an overall treatment programme. It is administered according to the
DAN (Defeat Autism Now) protocol and does bring significant
improvements in many cases. This is well documented by the Autism
Research Institute in San Diego.
While genetics undoubtably plays a role, were autism entirely genetic
we would not be seeing the dramatic surge we see today. At least one
expert using the same criteria for the diagnosis of autism for the past
30 years has found a tenfold increase in incidence.
There is evidence that environmental issues and increasing mercury
concentrations play a major role. That chronic, low-grade exposure to
heavy metals is toxic can no longer be disputed.
There is no doubt that chelation, properly administered, is both safe
and effective, providing significant health benefits. It has a 30-year
safety record .
Were intravenous EDTA and DMSA still patentable today and of
commercial interest, I have no doubt they would be widely used in
conventional medicine.
Dr T E Gabriel Stewart
is a GP in Castleknock, Dublin
The following article was published in the Irish Times on May 2nd, 2006, in
response to the article "A Dose of Cynicism" by Paul O'Donoghue of The Irish
Skeptics Society:
Mainstream medicine hostage to vested interests
Irish Times
Dr Gabriel Stewart replies to a recent Health Supplement article deriding
alternative treatments and puts forward his arguments for why conventional
medicine deserves its share of scepticism
In his article A dose of cynicism Paul O'Donoghue again takes a wide swipe at all
alternative treatments that fall out of the realm of conventional medicine.
He purports to understand why mainstream practitioners get involved in these
treatments. While many alternative treatments are rather bizarre, and patently do
not work, there are many well-trained and experienced physicians who integrate
beneficial treatments into their practices that are not part of mainstream medicine.
The main reason that these are not accepted is that they have not been proven by
the Randomised Clinical Trials so rigorously demanded by mainstream medicine.
Yet more than 80 per cent of conventional treatments have not been subject to
trials.
Publish
Many of the treatments which become part of medical dogma do so as a result of
clinical trails, many of which are fatally flawed. The following are some of the
problems which have been documented by experts in the field of clinical trials such
as Elmer Cranton, author JS Cohen, MD, who wrote a book entitled Overdose: The
case against drug companies and James P Carter MD, a professor of nutrition in
the US and author of Racketeering in Medicine:
1. Key findings in the body of these trials do not appear in the abstract or
summaries of the studies, which is all the physicians, reporters, insurers and others
may ever read.
2. References are selected to include only ones that support the papers'
conclusions.
3. Side effects which cause drop outs are often omitted.
4. Adverse effects are usually deprecated.
5. Trials are run only as long as the outcome favours treatment.
6. Unfavourable trials are not published.
7. The use of ghost writers and figurehead authors in papers on drug research has
been well documented, along with directions from sponsors to authors about what
key pages to include and what findings to de-emphasise. This point has been
made by a number of medical experts on the issue.
8. Only studies with the most favourable results are published.
9. More importantly, drug research gives details of relative risks, rather than
absolute risk. Research findings usually also give details of the reduction of the
death rate in specific categories, rather than the overall death rate which should be
given in clinical trials. This last point paints a rosy, but inaccurate picture of many
trials.
Doctors who incorporate effective treatments in their practices that are not
recommended by mainstream authorities, risk losing their licences and all that it
entails. The benefits of these treatments can often be demonstrated by clinical
observation and further verified by clinical tests. Pharmaceutical firms are not
interested in this particular approach as there is no money to be made from these
treatments.
Drug manufacturers also have a serious conflict of interest in trying to balance the
interests of employees and shareholders against the interest of patients.
A drug can cost up to €800 million to put on the market. Nor is the National Institute
of Health (NIH), in the US, nor the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) free
from the pharmaceutical industry's influence. It wasn't until last June the US House
of Representatives voted to prohibit doctors and scientists who work for drug
companies from sitting on FDA panels. It remains to be seen if this is confirmed by
the US Senate or if the drug companies can use their enormous influence to derail
it. Clinical observation is the most important vehicle for a physician to assess any
treatment.
However, with the advent of ever more stringent audits of doctors, the art of
medicine will be further eroded. Doctors will be forced to follow treatments, many of
which are based on poor science and flawed clinical trials. The cosy relationship
that exists between the medical powers that be, and the powerful pharmaceutical
industry will be further solidified.
O'Donoghue comments on treatments that do not have a scientific base. He states:
"Try wishing away appendicitis."
Yet this is apparently what happens in 20 per cent of cases.
Twenty per cent of appendectomies reveal appendices that are perfectly normal.
While these procedures are entirely justifiable it demonstrates that surgical
procedures are subject to the "mind over matter" placebo effect which science
cannot explain.
How many other procedures are placebo effect with no scientific basis as
demanded by O'Donoghue? It is believed that on average 30 per cent of
successful treatments are placebo effects.
For a drug treatment to be ratified, it barely has to exceed this.
O'Donoghue states that many naturally occurring materials are highly toxic. While
deaths from alternative practices are rare and when happen get headline-grabbing
attention, the same does not apply to conventional treatments. He fails to mention
that non error, adverse effects of drugs is the fourth leading cause of death in the
US each year. To put this into perspective, more people die from taking drugs
correctly, as prescribed by their doctor, every year in the US than are killed in road
accidents.
Some of the suggestions of experts to prevent perversion of trials include the
following: to prevent "manipulation" all government employees at NIH, FDA or
investigating bodies should be barred from any consulting agreements, or any form
of compensation or gifts. All clinical trials of devices, tests, surgeries, drugs
supplements should be registered with a totally independent NIH or some other
investigative body. Independent observers should be assigned to each study to
ensure it was not perverted or buried.
Only if these and other measurements are put in place can the public feel assured
in following any treatment either mainstream or alternative.
Dr Gabriel Stewart is a practising GP who uses both complementary and
conventional treatments. He has a clinic in Dublin.
© The Irish Times