Toxic Metals & Heavy Metal Intoxication

Symptoms of heavy meal intoxication – as with any condition, a person does not need to exhibit all of the symptoms to indicate the problem.
Frequent headaches
Mental confusion or "brain fog"
Short-term memory loss
Overwhelming tiredness
Dizziness
Hair loss
Tremors
Irritability
Unexplained rage
Pain in muscles and joints
Thyroid disease
Anemia

Treatment

Removing toxic metals from the body most often results in either a decrease or resolution of symptoms. Depending on the amount of toxic metals in the body, this process can take 3-24 months.

Toxic metals can be removed from the body by several means:
· Chelation with a metal binding drug either taken by mouth or via an intravenous (IV) treatment. The IV treatment is much more efficient at removing toxic metals than taking the drug by mouth. The great majority of people tolerate the chelation process with little side effects, and these can be decreased with specific supporting procedures.
· Binding with specific nutrients/minerals/herbs. This process is much slower than chelation but is suitable for those who have difficulty tolerating chelation treatments.
· Dietary detoxification including liver and bowel detoxification improves elimination of many environmental toxins with a very slow removal of toxic metals.
· Low temperature sauna is useful for improving toxic metal elimination.


Different toxic metals can have distinct symptom pictures

Nervous system signs (what you or others may notice) are common in acute and chronic cases of heavy metal intoxication. These consist of peripheral neuropathy from lead, arsenic, organic and inorganic mercury, and thallium; mental retardation or decline in cognitive function from organic and inorganic mercury and lead; psychotic episodes from arsenic and inorganic mercury; diseases of the brain with seizures from lead and arsenic; and visual disturbances or incoordination and unsteadiness from organic mercury.

Testing for toxic metals

Rationale: Most heavy metal intoxication is chronic, and so the body removes it from the blood so it cannot do as much harm, and stores it in organs, tissues or bone. Conventional physicians almost always test blood first, and often the concentration of toxic metals is below the level they consider to be problematic. In order for there to be measurable blood levels the exposure to the metal needs to be high enough and close enough to blood sampling for it to be present. For this reason, mainstream medicine rarely considers toxic metals to be problematic because they don’t find them in the blood.
Types of tests:
· Blood – acceptable for acute exposure (intake) of metal within three days of testing. Arsenic is cleared from the blood quickly so urine may be a better specimen.
· Hair – can serve as a screening test, especially in children. Hair is easily contaminated by environmental exposure and hair-care products. Testing between different labs shows inconsistency.
· Urine – useful in acute exposure within 3-5 days. After this the excretion of toxic metals decreases quickly to a non-exposed level.
· Provoked urine – this test has two samples that need to be submitted for testing. The first is a random urine sample, this is the same as Urine above. The second is collected 6 hours after a toxic metal binding drug is given. If the level of toxic metal in the second sample is 3-5 times greater than the first sample, the toxic metal may be present in significant amounts (enough to cause disease) in the body.