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REJUVENATION FORUM>
DETOXING CHEMICALS/POLLUTANTS FOR OPTIMAL HEALTH
November 17, 2005
By Jeff Morris
Are your patients toxic? The answer increasingly appears to
be yes—and your job, in order to maintain optimal health
and reduce the incidence of the diseases of aging, is to
detoxify them. That conclusion is one being reached by more
and more anti-aging practitioners, and achieves particular
resonance with Rashid O. Buttar, D.O. of Cornelius, NC, and
Robert A. Nash, M.D. of Virginia Beach, VA.
“I can now very comfortably and definitively state to you,”
says Dr. Buttar, “that, in my opinion, based on the
evidence, every single chronic insidious disease process is
related to one word: toxicity. You cannot address the
issues of aging unless you address detoxification.” Dr.
Buttar, board certified and a diplomat in preventive
medicine and clinical metal toxicology, and Vice-Chairman
of the American Board of Clinical Metal Toxicology,
contends that he only recently arrived at this conclusion.
“Five years ago I wouldn’t have said this, even a year ago
I wouldn’t have said it. But the more success we’ve had,
the clearer it has become: All chronic disease is toxicity.
You get rid of the toxicity and you put out the fire. You
may need to rebuild afterward, but you must put the fire
out. Conventional medicine is just covering your eyes so
you don’t see the fire.”
Dr. Nash, who is board certified in neurology, pain
medicine, and chelation therapy and is Chairman of the
American Board of Clinical Metal Toxicology, concurs,
though perhaps not 100 percent. “Most of the diseases of
aging—vascular, most cancers, arthritis and others—have
been shown to be associated with toxic metals and
persistent organic pollutants. Vascular diseases, stroke,
heart attack, plus most of the cancers and macular
degeneration, have been directly linked to lead. That’s
just lead,” notes Dr. Nash.
And “just lead” is but a minor fraction of the toxic soup
in which we have all come to stew. As Walter J. Crinnion,
N.D., chairman of the department of environmental medicine
at Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine, Phoenix,
wrote six years ago, “Chemical compounds ubiquitous in our
food, air, and water are now found in every person. The
bioaccumulation of these compounds in some individuals can
lead to a variety of metabolic and systemic dysfunctions,
and in some cases outright disease states.” (Altern Med Rev
2000;5(1):52-63) Dr. Crinnion wrote that some individuals
appear to be less able to clear the daily chemical exposure
from the body than others, leading to a total load of
toxins that exceeds the ability of the body to adapt; at
that point, damage to certain organ systems can occur. “The
systems most affected by these xenobiotic compounds include
the immune, neurological, and endocrine systems.”
Immunotoxicity, according to Dr. Crinnion, may be the major
factor in the increasing rates of asthma, allergies,
cancers, and chronic viral infections. But the effects are
widespread: “Neurological toxicity can affect cognition,
mood, and cause chronic neurological illnesses. Endocrine
toxicity can affect reproduction, menses, libido,
metabolism, stress-handling ability, glucose regulation,
and other important functions.”
A 2003 U.S. study by the Centers for Disease Control
revealed the presence of 116 chemicals—some of them banned
for more than two decades because of toxicity—in people of
all ages. In July 2005, the CDC released the third National
Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals, which
the organization stated was “the most extensive assessment
ever made of the exposure of the U.S. population to
chemicals in our environment.” CDC claims that its
Environmental Health Laboratory at the National Center for
Environmental Health (NCEH), using “advanced laboratory
science and innovative techniques,” has been in the
forefront of efforts to assess people's exposure to
environmental chemicals. “CDC's highly trained laboratory
scientists have built on more than three decades of
experience in measuring chemicals directly in people's
blood or urine, a process known as biomonitoring.” While
presenting first-time exposure information for 38 of the
148 chemicals included, the CDC makes clear that “the
measurement of an environmental chemical in a person’s
blood or urine does not by itself mean that the chemical
causes disease … separate studies of varying exposure
levels and health effects are needed to determine which
blood or urine levels result in disease.” However,
according to Dr. Buttar, “the number one concern among
scientists at CDC, which they cannot say publicly, is
mercury; number two is arsenic.”
The CDC report also makes an important distinction: that
the level of chemicals found within the body is a result of
the cumulative impact of many different types of exposure.
“Concentrations of environmental chemicals in blood or
urine are not the same as those in air, water, food, soil,
or dust. For example, a chemical concentration of 10 ìg/L
in water does not produce a level of 10 ìg/L in blood or
urine. Blood or urine levels may reflect exposure from one
or more sources, including air, water, food, soil, and
dust. Levels of a chemical in blood and urine are
determined by how much of the chemical has entered the body
through all routes of exposure, including ingestion,
inhalation, or dermal absorption, and how the chemical is
distributed in body tissues, transformed into metabolites,
and eliminated from the body.” Not only does this reinforce
the concept that environmental pollutants are ubiquitous in
our environment, it also makes the findings more useful
from a health standpoint: “Biomonitoring measurements are
the most
health-relevant assessments of exposure because they
measure the amount of the chemical that actually gets into
people from all environmental sources combined. With a few
exceptions, it is the concentration of the chemical in
people that provides the best exposure information to
evaluate the potential for adverse health effects,” notes
the CDC.
The implications of multiple-source exposure are
disturbing. Britain’s Environmental Toxins Foundation (ETF)
states that “more and more research [is] pointing towards
mounting evidence of structural and genetic damage,
potentially caused to the human morphology, through the
huge influx of chemical agents found in the air, soil and
water today… As more and more people are made aware of the
implications from the accumulation of varying levels of
different chemicals in our bodies, the need to monitor and
curb the influx of these agents permeating into our daily
lives, becomes seemingly obvious. An influx of agents
absorbed, ingested and inhaled from the food we eat, the
water we drink and from the air we breath… this very
crucial issue of: chronic sub-lethal poisoning to our
bodies from the: inhalation, ingestion and absorption of
heavy metals, inorganic and organic chemical compounds
which are increasingly prevalent in our modern
environment.”
In a paper published in Alternative Therapies, July/August
2005, “Metals in Medicine,” Dr. Nash sums up recent
developments in his specialty, metal toxicity: “During the
past five years, the understanding of vascular disease has
changed. Vulnerable plaque has replaced stenotic lesion as
the main cause of vascular problems. Questions about the
long-term benefits of coronary artery bypass grafting
(CABG) surgery have been raised. Metals have been
implicated in many of the diseases of aging as well as in
neurodevelopmental diseases and autism spectrum disorders.
The American Board of Chelation Therapy (ABCT) has formally
changed its name to the American Board of Clinical Metal
Toxicology (ABCMT) because of the new scientific
association of toxicant metals with multiple diseases.” Dr.
Nash also explains that with the advent of the industrial
revolution, the presence of many metals, such as lead and
mercury, in the environment has increased. “Tobacco, which
tends to bio-concentrate cadmium, is a major producer of
metal. Arsenic has been used in the past in agriculture.
Forest fires release metals, especially mercury, from
stable seleno-mercurial compounds that are extraordinary
stable in the tree during its life. Volcanoes also spew out
copious amounts of mercury. One study done with ice core
drilling from a glacier in northwest Wyoming collated every
major volcanic eruption with a heavy level of mercury.
Nature acts as our best filter, with plant life and trees
trapping many toxins, including toxicant metals. Between
nature and man, we have polluted the planet. Man’s
pollution is by far the most toxic. We are now paying a
price for our environmental neglect. That price appears to
be the increasing diseases of aging, such as vascular
disease, congestive heart failure, and cancers.”
Evidence of the role of environmental toxins in disease
continues to pile up. A report detailing new links between
environmental toxicants and breast cancer, “State of the
Evidence 2004: What Is the Connection Between the
Environment and Breast Cancer?” concluded that exposure to
synthetic chemicals and radiation has contributed more than
previously thought to the rising incidence of breast
cancer. The report was jointly released October 7, 2004 by
the Breast Cancer Fund, a non-profit environmental health
organization, and Breast Cancer Action, a non-profit
national education and advocacy organization. It contained
new evidence from 21 research studies published since
February 2003 adding to existing evidence linking toxicants
in the environment to breast cancer, and was peer-reviewed
by six leading scientists, including a noted scientist from
the International Agency for Research on Cancer, a division
of the World Health Organization. According to the report,
in the past 50 years, a woman's lifetime risk of breast
cancer more than tripled in the United States, to one in
seven today. This trend parallels a staggering increase of
chemicals in the environment: the report says that
“compelling scientific evidence” points to some of the
85,000 synthetic chemicals in use today as contributing to
breast cancer by altering hormone function or gene
_expression. Fewer than one in 10 cases of breast cancer
occurs in women born with a genetic predisposition for the
disease. As many as 50 percent of breast cancer cases
remain unexplained by personal characteristics and other
traditionally accepted risk factors; epidemiologists and
other scientists increasingly believe many cases are linked
to environmental factors. “This [is] the clearest evidence
yet that the rise in breast cancer incidence is linked to
exposure to radiation and toxic chemicals,” said Nancy
Evans, a health science consultant for the Breast Cancer
Fund and the editor of the report. “Medical X-rays,
pesticides, household cleaning products, personal care
products and some pharmaceuticals—these are just a few of
the multiple and chronic exposures contributing to this
epidemic.”
Other studies continue in an attempt to determine whether
endometriosis, a source of chronic pelvic pain in women,
may be caused by environmental agents, including exposure
to man-made chemicals such as dioxin and PCBs. As far back
as 1992, research showed that endometriosis in monkeys
could be caused by exposure to dioxin.
Lynn Tondat Carter, Ph.D., whose doctorate is in
physiological psychology and is Professor of Psychology at
the University of Massachusetts, writes in The Celestine
Journal that toxins that directly affect the nervous
system, called neurotoxins, also affect our immune
functions, since the nervous system is intricately
connected to the immune system. “Thus, our very ability to
think and feel normally can be drastically affected by
exposure to toxins. It does not take a giant leap of logic
to realize that we could soon be in such a state of toxic
poisoning that we would be unable to ‘problem-solve’ our
way out.” Continues Dr. Carter:
“In 1989 alone, EPA estimates, in its Toxic Release
Inventory National Report, that 1.9 billion pounds of
chemical were dumped into our nation's water systems. In
that same year, 2.4 billion pounds of chemicals were
released into the atmosphere; with the total chemical
attack on the environment estimated at 5.7 billion pounds.
This is only in one year. According to a recent report by
the National Research Council, 70,000 of the chemicals in
commercial use today have not even been tested for
neurotoxic effects.
Known neurotoxins that we are most commonly exposed to are
lead, mercury, cadmium and pesticides. Most of these toxins
are colorless and odorless, making sensory detection
impossible. While sudden poisoning can result in immediate
reactions that are traceable to the source, the symptoms of
poisoning from today's pollution may come on more slowly
due to a gradual build-up.
Here is just a partial list of common sub-clinical symptoms
of toxicity: fatigue, lethargy, depression, headaches,
allergies, chronic infection, frequent colds, nervousness,
sudden anger, sensitivity to perfume/odors, memory loss and
joint pains. Because so many of these symptoms could stem
from a multitude of other causes, often toxicity is not
readily suspected. With continued exposure, neurotoxins may
trigger the _expression of a disease for which one has a
genetic predisposition. In general, it is thought that
toxins pose the most dangerous risk for our children.”
Dr. Buttar points to a July 2005 paper, released by the
Environmental Working Group (www.ewg.org), that confirms
the worst fear: that the average person does not need to
spend years being exposed to environmental pollutants to be
affected—nor does the average child. In “Body Burden—The
Pollution in Newborns,” EWG reports, “Not long ago
scientists thought that the placenta shielded cord
blood—and the developing baby—from most chemicals and
pollutants in the environment. But now we know that at this
critical time when organs, vessels, membranes and systems
are knit together from single cells to finished form in a
span of weeks, the umbilical cord carries not only the
building blocks of life, but also a steady stream of
industrial chemicals, pollutants and pesticides that cross
the placenta as readily as residues from cigarettes and
alcohol…” Specifically, says the EWG:
“In a study spearheaded by the Environmental Working Group
in collaboration with Commonweal, researchers at two major
laboratories found an average of 200 industrial chemicals
and pollutants in umbilical cord blood from 10 babies born
in August and September of 2004 in U.S. hospitals. Tests
revealed a total of 287 chemicals in the group. The
umbilical cord blood of these 10 children, collected by Red
Cross after the cord was cut, harbored pesticides, consumer
product ingredients, and wastes from burning coal,
gasoline, and garbage.
Of the 287 chemicals we detected in umbilical cord blood,
we know that 180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are
toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth
defects or abnormal development in animal tests. The
dangers of pre- or post-natal exposure to this complex
mixture of carcinogens, developmental toxins and
neurotoxins have never been studied.”
EWG goes on to explain why the presence of these substances
in umbilical cord blood has such profound and long-lasting
implications:
Chemical exposures in the womb or during infancy can be
dramatically more harmful than exposures later in life.
Substantial scientific evidence demonstrates that children
face amplified risks from their body burden of pollution;
the findings are particularly strong for many of the
chemicals found in this study, including mercury, PCBs and
dioxins. Children's vulnerability derives from both rapid
development and incomplete defense systems:
• A developing child's chemical exposures are greater
pound-for-pound than those of adults.
• An immature, porous blood-brain barrier allows greater
chemical exposures to the developing brain.
• Children have lower levels of some chemical-binding
proteins, allowing more of a chemical to reach "target
organs."
• A baby's organs and systems are rapidly developing, and
thus are often more vulnerable to damage from chemical
exposure.
• Systems that detoxify and excrete industrial chemicals
are not fully developed.
• The longer future life span of a child compared to an
adult allows more time for adverse effects to arise.
Most disturbing about these findings to Dr. Buttar is that
in every case, mercury was found. The presence of mercury
is attributed to pollution from coal-fired power plants,
mercury-containing products, and certain industrial
processes. It accumulates in seafood. And, though you might
think the mercury problem has been abated, Dr. Nash cites a
November 17, 2004 Wall Street Journal article by Matt
Pottinger, Steve Stecklow and John J. Fialka describing the
high levels of mercury that are now being spread,
particularly by massive industrial development in China. As
the article states, “Mercury and other pollutants from
China's more than 2,000 coal-fired power plants soar high
into the atmosphere and around the globe on what has become
a transcontinental conveyor belt of bad air. North America
and Europe add their own dirty loads to the belt. But Asia,
pulsating with the economic rebirth of China and India, is
the largest contributor.” It further explains:
Scientists long assumed mercury settled into the ground or
water soon after it spewed forth as a gas from smokestacks.
But using satellites, airplanes and supercomputers,
scientists are now tracking air pollution with
unprecedented precision, discovering plumes of soot, ozone,
sulfates and mercury that drift eastward across oceans and
continents…The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
recently reported that a third of the country's lakes and
nearly a quarter of its rivers are now so polluted with
mercury that children and pregnant women are advised to
limit or avoid eating fish caught there. Warnings about
mercury, a highly toxic metal used in things ranging from
dental fillings to watch batteries, have been issued by 45
states and cover four of the five Great Lakes. Some
scientists now say 30% or more of the mercury settling into
U.S. ground soil and waterways comes from other countries –
in particular, China…Mining, waste incineration and coal
combustion emit the metal in the form of an invisible gas.
After it rains down and seeps into wetlands, rivers and
lakes, microbes convert it into methylmercury, a compound
that works its way up the food chain into fish and
eventually people.
The EWG report states, “Methylmercury exposure in the womb
causes measurable declines in brain function in children
exposed to levels corresponding to 58 parts per billion in
maternal blood (NAS 2000b). Researchers in the Netherlands
found a doubling in the risk of heart attacks and death
from coronary heart disease at methylmercury hair levels of
2 mg/kg, which corresponds to about one fifth the assumed
safe maternal blood level (Salonen, et al. 1995). Increased
diastolic and systolic blood pressure and decreased heart
rate variability in developmentally exposed children have
also been observed at doses below what the EPA considers a
safe maternal blood level (NAS 2000b, Sorensen et al.
1999).” The Wall Street Journal reinforces this: “The
dangers of significant methylmercury exposure to the
nervous system are well documented, particularly in fetuses
and children. Permanent harm to children can range from
subtle deficits in memory and attention span to mental
retardation. In January [2004], EPA scientists released
research indicating that 630,000 U.S. babies born during a
12-month period in 1999-2000 had potentially unsafe levels
of mercury in their blood – about twice as many babies as
previously estimated.” Among the possible implications of
mercury and other toxins cited by EWG:
Major nervous system disorders. Several recent studies have
determined that the reported incidence of autism is
increasing, and is now almost 10 times higher than in the
mid-1980's (Byrd 2002, Chakrabarti and Fombonne 2001). The
number of children being diagnosed and treated for
attention deficit disorder (ADD) and attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has also increased
dramatically in the past decade (Robison et al. 1999,
Robison et al. 2002, Zito et al. 2000). The causes are
largely unexplained, but environmental factors, including
chemical exposures, are considered a likely contributor.
Environmental factors have also been increasingly linked
with Parkinson's disease (Checkoway and Nelson 1999, Engel
et al. 2001).
In “Metals in Medicine,” Dr. Nash goes into more detail:
Mercury is known to affect the brain and has been
associated with the causation or exacerbation of
degenerative diseases such as amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, multiple sclerosis, and
Parkinson’s disease... mercury is associated with autism,
the degenerative diseases of the brain mentioned above,
neurodevelopmental diseases, vascular diseases,
nephrotoxicity, and cancer. [Clarkson TW, Magos L, Myers
GJ. The toxicology of mercury—current exposures and
clinical manifestations.N Engl J Med.
2003;349(18):1731-1737] points out that “the fetal brain is
more susceptible than the adult brain to mercury induced
damage.” Specifically, methylmercury “inhibits the division
and migration of neuronal cells” and “disrupts the
cytoarchitecture of the developing brain.” Recent studies
have correlated the explosive increase of autism with
thimerosal, an additive to many vaccines that contains 50%
ethyl mercury.
This issue of a connection between thimerosal and autism
has been of particular concern to both Dr. Buttar and Dr.
Nash. As we reported in the June 14, 2005 issue of the
e-Journal, Dr. Buttar testified in 2004 before a
congressional subcommittee hearing sponsored by Rep. Dan
Burton (R-IN) about the connection between heavy
metals—particularly mercury—and autism. Dr. Buttar
discussed the chelation therapy he had offered his own son,
who had a profound developmental delay and is now an
example of how autism can be fully and permanently reversed
in some children. Dr. Nash was one of a number of experts
who joined with Rep. Burton’s House Government Reform
Subcommittee on Human Rights and Wellness to refute the
findings published in the Institute of Medicine (IOM)
Immunization Safety Review Committee's Vaccines and Autism
report of May 18, 2004. In that report, the eighth and
final in a series designed to examine the safety of
vaccines that contain thimerosal, the IOM Committee
concluded, "The body of epidemiological evidence favors the
rejection of a causal relationship between
thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism,” even though the
Committee had in a 2001 report called such a causal
relationship, “biologically plausible.” The Committee based
its final conclusions on their review of approximately 10
previously conducted epidemiological studies. Of those
roughly 10 studies, 5 reported probable links between
thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism, yet those 5 were
summarily dismissed because the Committee determined the
manner in which they were conducted was flawed. At that
time, Rep. Burton stated, “I believe the [IOM] findings are
heavily biased, and unrepresentative of all the available
scientific and medical research. I think it is highly
irresponsible for the IOM Immunization Safety Review
Committee to purport definitive findings to the American
public, which are based on selective scientific studies
that are greatly flawed to begin with.”
The NIH describes chelation is a chemical process in which
a substance is used to bind molecules, such as metals or
minerals, and hold them tightly so that they can be removed
from a system, such as the body. In medicine, says the NIH,
chelation has been scientifically proven to rid the body of
excess or toxic metals. For example, a person who has lead
poisoning may be given chelation therapy in order to bind
and remove excess lead from the body before it can cause
damage. Chelation therapy has been a keystone of Dr.
Buttar’s treatment program, with which he has reported
great success in improving the prospects for autistic
children. His Advanced Concepts in Medicine clinic
specializes in treating cancer, heart disease and other
chronic conditions in patients refractory to conventional
treatments, with a special emphasis on the
interrelationship between metal toxicity and insidious
disease processes. With his newfound conviction that every
chronic disease is related to toxicity, Dr. Buttar’s
treatment philosophy is likely to take on even greater
significance. As he puts it, “These aren’t my theories,
these things have been out there. What we have done is
taken that hypothesis and figured out how to remove those
toxins. The problem is the simplicity of it makes most
people say it can’t be—it’s more complicated.” Dr. Buttar
does not limit toxicity to only metal and chemical
pollutants, however. He categorizes toxins into five
groups, of which the first three, he says, are measurable,
with the last two being “more esoteric”:
1. Metals – The CDC list of metal pollutants includes
Antimony
Barium
Beryllium
Cadmium
Cesium
Cobalt
Lead
Mercury
Molybdenum
Platinum
Tungsten
Thallium
Uranium
2. Organic pollutants – benzines, hydrocarbons, etc.
3. Opportunistics – bacteria, virus, yeast; these need an
opportunity to set up house, and find it in immune systems
damaged from toxicity groups 1 and 2.
4. Energy – electromagnetics cause a disruption in our
resonance; microwaves are the most dangerous.
5. Spiritual, psychological, emotional – someone who is not
“whole,” lacking something. Explains Dr. Buttar, “We’ve
gotten cancer patients to the point that everything is
fine, but their ‘time is up’; patients who on autopsy show
no evidence of cancer, but still died.”
Dr. Nash noted in “Metals in Medicine” that the effects of
toxicant metals on human health have been reported in
peer-reviewed literature with increasing frequency; they
are present in many diseases of aging, especially vascular
diseases. And though historical experience of toxicologists
who treated individuals poisoned by acutely toxicant metals
is waning—very few of these cases have been reported during
the past 30 years in the U.S.—researchers with a special
interest in clinical metal toxicology have noticed a
clinical correlation between metal detoxification by
chelation therapy and clinical improvement of vascular
diseases.
In 2002, the National Center for Complementary and
Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) and the National Heart, Lung,
and Blood Institute (NHLBI), both components of the
National Institutes of Health (NIH), announced the Trial To
Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT). TACT is the first
large-scale, multicenter study to determine the safety and
efficacy of EDTA chelation therapy for individuals with
coronary artery disease (CAD), the most common form of
heart disease. The principal investigator for the trial is
Gervasio A. Lamas, M.D., director of cardiovascular
research and academic affairs at Mount Sinai Medical
Center-Miami Heart Institute, Miami Beach, a
board-certified cardiologist and an associate professor of
medicine at University of Miami School of Medicine. Dr.
Nash is serving on the NIH Data and Safety Management Board
of the study—“I am one of seven on the panel to oversee
this study, for safety reasons,” he says. Investigators
enrolled the first participants in September 2003. The
study will take approximately five years to complete.
Dr. Nash says he can only speak with authority on metal
detoxification, but in his view, the “big 4” metal toxins
are lead, mercury, arsenic, and cadmium. “All four are
easily detected by provoked urine testing,” says Dr. Nash.
“We’re finding in excess of 95 percent of the population
over 50 has large amounts of toxic metals in the body when
provoked urine testing is performed.” The treatment he
recommends is to detoxify the body of these metals. Dr.
Nash hopes the group of professionals to which he belongs,
called clinical metal toxicologists, can provide better
disease management by using a new standard of preventive
care. “Look at the cost of treatment. Most of the cost—up
to 60 percent of Medicare—goes to heroic efforts during the
last six months of life. Most of us feel that money should
be spent on true diagnosis as well as better disease
management. We feel that we need to detoxify as best we
can, and provide patients with adequate micro and macro
dietary intake to provide building blocks to build up their
own immune systems.”
Of particular concern to those treating the diseases of
aging is the possible connection between mercury and
Alzheimer’s disease. Dr. Nash notes, “Some of the
[mercurous] vapors [from dental amalgams] reach the brain
via the ethmoid sinuses. Is it coincidental that
Alzheimer’s disease has shown degenerative tracts often
following the olfactory connections?…There is increasing
evidence of mercury associated with Alzheimer’s disease.
Dr. Boyd Haley, Chairman of the Department of Biochemistry,
University of Kentucky, has published multiple papers on
his research since the late 1980s. He has successfully
reproduced the changes seen in Alzheimer’s disease in the
brain homogenate of normal brains with the addition of
mercury, in the form of both mercury chloride and
thimerosal.” Some people hypothesize that mercury may
contribute to autism on one end of the lifespan and
Alzheimer’s on the other end, Dr. Nash told us. “I’m not
convinced that mercury is the sole cause, but other factors
may be involved. It could be a genetic thing. It appears
there is a third of the people who are genetically prone to
not getting rid of the metals, who may be most susceptible
for Alzheimer’s disease.” In his article, Dr. Nash goes on
to conclude, “The work of Haley, Aposhian, Godfrey, and
others makes a strong case that mercury may cause or at the
very least exacerbate Alzheimer’s disease. Studies looking
at toxic metals, especially mercury, as a possible cause
for Alzheimer’s disease need to be conducted. The clinical
metal toxicologists have clinical experience that early
metal detoxification will often stabilize and even reverse
early Alzheimer’s disease. More research is needed.”
As with other integrative practitioners, Dr. Nash sees the
necessity for a fundamental change in the way medicine
approaches disease. “We need to find out what is causative
of diseases of aging. This will take time, but we have not
had an adequate prevention of diseases. Most patients who
see doctors do not have diseases, they have symptoms.
Doctors know symptoms don’t kill folks, but they placate
patients with medications to ease symptoms. The mechanism
is straightforward; in the clinical setting you can shift
the physician’s mindset from only treating the symptoms of
disease, to understand that these diseases have correlates
that we have never recognized.” Dr. Nash believes that
recognition of causative factors of disease is a trend that
is spreading worldwide. In “Metals in Medicine” he
concludes,
“Toxicant metals are increasingly being associated with
multiple disease states…The Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services (CMS) have authorized payment for
in-office, intravenous metals detoxification in the
District of Columbia, Delaware, Maryland, Texas, and
Virginia, as well as the Indian Health Service. This is a
great opportunity to collect meaningful data directly from
patients. It is known that dialysis can be delayed at least
two or three years by repeated in-office, intravenous
metals detoxification; it is hoped that all prospective
dialysis patients would be tested for toxicant metals and
treated appropriately. If detoxification of toxicant metals
can become the standard in time, our health may improve
markedly. Could toxicant metals be a diagnosable and
treatable risk factor in many of the diseases affecting
this nation? The clinical metal toxicologists are the
experts in low-dose, chronic accumulation of toxicant
metals and the symptomatic reversal observed with
treatment. Many clinical metal toxicologists are
participating in the NIH’s TACT study. More research is
needed in the basic science mechanisms of toxicant metals
and common diseases. Additional clinical research, besides
the TACT study, is also needed.”
“I believe toxicant metals and their detection and
detoxification will be one of the exciting new fields in
medicine. I have great hope for the future of medicine,”
adds Dr. Nash.
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