MERCURY AND OTHER METAL TESTS ARE OFTEN PERFORMED INCORRECTLY, CAUSING FALSE HIGH RESULTS, FRIGHTENING PEOPLE UNNECESSARILY

MERCURY AND OTHER METAL TESTS ARE OFTEN PERFORMED INCORRECTLY, CAUSING FALSE HIGH RESULTS, FRIGHTENING PEOPLE UNNECESSARILY

     People frequently contact me with questions abut their mercury and other metal test results, after being told that their levels are high and toxic. They have often been told that they require a course of chelation therapy. Upon reviewing such laboratory reports, I usually find that urine levels of mercury (and other metals) were tested after being provoked using either EDTA, DMSA or DMPS as a chelator. The urine test result is commonly reported incorrectly on a form using reference ranges derived from urine collected without a prior provocative chelation—without any chelator. The result therefore, usually appears deceptively high. By provoking urine excretion with a chelator, metals in urine will always increase, by up to 1,000% or more, even if levels in the body are at quite safe and low levels. That type of report is meaningless and can frighten patients into thinking they are toxic when their levels are actually quite safe.

    All toxins have a safe threshold below which there is no toxicity. It is a common mistake, based on fear and misinformation, to believe that a toxin has a linear toxic effect down to the lowest levels. In fact, below a safe threshold toxicity disappears and there is no toxicity—and in some cases even benefit. All metals are present in the earth's crust and enter our bodies continuously at low levels—in the air we breath, in the food we eat and in the water we drink. It is not possible to totally eliminate all exposure. The goal is to stay below a toxic threshold.

     Everyone has a small amount of mercury, lead, arsenic, etc., in their body, along with every other known metal, both toxic and non-toxic. The only limitation to detection is the sensitivity of instruments used. If DMPS, DMSA, EDTA, or any other chelator is given, subsequent urinary excretion of metals metals will increase greatly. That will even occur in people with low and safe levels of mercury and other potentially toxic metals. You need to know whether or not the amount detected is high enough to cause symptoms of toxicity. Is it a toxic level? The only way to do that is to compare measured results with other measurements, using the same type of specimen collection and instruments, on large number of people who do not have metal toxicity—and also by comparing to data with known epidemics of toxic exposure. Some laboratories used by chelationists do not provide that type of meaningful report.

     Reference ranges for upper safe limits for metals, including mercury in urine, are often printed on laboratory report forms with ranges that apply only to urine collected without first giving a chelator. Reference ranges printed on such report forms will be much lower than even the lowest level commonly excreted after a provoked chelation.   The safe upper limit on the report form will thus be much higher after a chelator. If proper procedures are followed, a large majority of people tested will be in the nontoxic range. As heavy metal testing is now reported by laboratories that cater to chelationists, a deceptively high percentage of patients will appear to be in the toxic range for some metal or other.

    It is not true that there’s no "safe" level for mercury. Mercury and other metals only becomes toxic when they exceed a tolerable, safe level. If billions of people can exist without toxic symptoms at a tolerably low level of heavy metals, and if that has been the case as long as mankind has existed on the earth, it is highly misleading to tell patients they have "heavy metal toxicity" and need to undergo a course of chelation.

     To correctly interpret a test result and to know if you really do have a heavy metal problem, you must know the levels measured in a large population of healthy people who suffer no toxicity. Blood or urine specimens must be tested using the same method of preparation and collection. You may ask the clinic ordering the test to provide you with the mean (average) level and the percentiles of test results from a series of at least 100 consecutive test subjects using the same protocol you used—eliminating only statistical outliers. At the mean ("average") level, approximately 50% of all people tested will have higher levels.   At the mean level plus one standard deviation (SD), approximately 16% of the population at large will be higher. At the mean plus 2 SD, 2.5 % will be higher. At mean plus 3 SD, less than 1% will be higher. Those percentages will vary somewhat with the distribution of values, but this method allows an approximation. Another way to establish toxic levels printed on on laboratory report forms is to use published data from known epidemics of industrial, environmental or occupational exposures—establishing levels below which no signs of illness occur in studied populations. It is unjustified to diagnose metal toxicity at a level below the level measure in a large percentage of the population that has symptoms of toxicity.

By carefully studying large populations of people known to have been poisoned in epidemics mercury exposure, it has been possible to determine the blood, urine and hair levels that resulted in toxic symptoms. This was done at Minamata Bay in Kyushu, Japan. Mercury was there was disposed of into the the bay by a chemical manufacturing company, Chisso, that used mercury as a catalyst in the production of acetylaldehyde. Victims were poisoned by contaminated fish and shellfish from the bay. Another mercury epidemic occured in Iraq, caused by bread made with wheat that had been treated with a methyl mercury fungicide.

   A study was done in the Faro Islands on a population of people who accumulated mercury by eating large amounts of whale meat. Whale meat contains a a significant concentration of PCBs, that confused the picture, and whale eating was in binges when whales were caught. A more recent study in the Seychelles Islands involved mercury accumulation from ocean fish that were not contaminated with PCBs and were consumed on a regular basis 12 or more times every week. Data from these studies indicates that the danger is less than previously feared.

HOW MUCH MERCURY IS TOO MUCH?

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER

How is mercury exposure measured? Scientists can determine a person's exposure to mercury (especially methyl mercury, the most toxic form) by measuring mercury content in hair. By comparing these levels to the results of very sophisticated batteries of tests, scientists try to determine the lowest level that might be harmful.
At what level does mercury become harmful? Based on scientific results from exhaustive studies of known episodes of poisoning, the World Health Organization has placed the level at which risk begins at 50 ppm of mercury in hair for most people. The WHO then applied a safety factor of 10, estimating that a level of 5 or less is safe for even the most vulnerable populations. More recently the University of Rochester conducted an extensive study in the Seychelles Islands of the most sensitive population (pregnant women and their young children from birth onward) where the average hair mercury level is about 7 ppm, about 10 times the level of the U.S. population. These people ate ocean fish 12 or times or more often every week. Scientists found no harm from mercury at levels up to 15 ppm, nearly twice the average Seychelles level and about 20 times higher than the average U.S. level. Despite those reports, hair analysis laboratories in the U.S. continue to report of toxicity at only 1 ppm.

    As you can see immediately above, it is customary for the EPA and for clinical laboratories to apply a safety factor of 10 on report forms. If the lowest known level associated with toxicity is 50 ppm, the WHO sets the recommended range for the general public below 5 ppm. Thus, is it highly unlikely that toxicity is responsible for symptoms unless the measured level is at least 10 time the upper limit on a laboratory report form. For industrial workers who are regularly exposed to mercury on the job, OSHA sets the allowable limits much higher, closer to a proven toxic level, before removing a worker from further exposure.

    You will probably hear vigorous objections from chelationists to what I have written here. I only ask that they first review all of the scientific toxicology literature, as I have. When I once questioned the owner of a laboratory about why the lab uses deceptive report forms that greatly exaggerate toxicity, I was told chelation clinics ordering the tests want it that way.

    Using the very latest in technology and laboratory instrumentation, blood testing for heavy metals can now be very accurate and reliable, if performed by a competent laboratory with good quality control (not always the case). Instruments in the past were often primitive by comparison.

     I recommend testing on whole blood, in preference to urine or serum tests. I find blood testing is to be a more accurate way to detect assess heavy metal toxicity of all types. Hair testing for methyl mercury can also be reliable. The upper safe limit for hair mercury is 15 g/gm (ppm), based on the latest research in the Seychelles Islands by the University of Rochester. When we occasionally do test urine, we use random unprovoked urine specimens and measure mercury and other elements relative to urine creatinine. That method cancels out errors caused by state of hydration and variable fluid intake, which varies the concentration solutes in urine. We no longer provoke excretion with a chelator before collecting urine for testing because it causes large false elevations.

Click here to read the upper limits of safe levels as published in the scientific literature.

Click here to read about the clinical toxicology of mercury in various forms.

Click here for a list of scientific studies published on metal toxicity.

    Hair analysis can be used as a screening test for mercury only. It is never wise to make a final diagnosis of any disease or to begin a lengthy course of therapy based on any single laboratory test result. Laboratory error is all too frequent to justify that. For example, it is not accepted practice to begin treatment for diabetes with only one blood sugar reading, or treat gout after a single uric acid test.

    Accurate mercury testing is technically difficult and not all laboratories have good quality control. In the past we have submitted multiple samples from the same specimen collection to several different laboratories to compare results. The reports sometimes varied widely.   We have also submitted portions the same specimen to the same laboratory at different times, also with variable results. The laboratories we recommend are Laboratory Corporation of America (LabCorp), and Quest Diagnostics. Blood draw stations for those two labs can be found in most cities in the USA (look in the yellow pages). We have found test results from those two laboratories to consistently be accurate and their report forms use reference ranges based on OSHA and EPA standards, using published scientific and toxicology literature—without exaggeration that might frighten patients into unneeded chelation.

     Click here to see safe ranges as published in scientific literature.

DMSA vs DMPS

In my opinion, DMPS is obsolete and no longer has a place in medicine. I have heard from a number of people around the country who received intravenous DMPS and were made quite sick by it—sometimes permanently. Even if DMPS were desirable, it can be effectively given by mouth without intravenous infusions.

    DMSA is more effective, however, because it removes both mercury and lead from the brain more effectively. DMSA removes mercury, lead and arsenic from the brain almost 3 times more effectively than DMPS

    DMSA is safer, less expensive, and can be taken by mouth. Chelationists who profit from administering intravenous DMPS and others have falsely rumored that DMSA is less effective or increases mercury in the brain. EDTA can remove lead but has no effect on methyl mercury in the brain.

    EDTA is a very weak chelator of mercury and is not an effective treatment for mercury toxicity.   DMSA is best for mercury and can given by mouth. It is safer, more effective, and much less expensive.

The two internet links below report information about the toxicity of DMPS.

www.dmpsbackfire.com/default.shtml

www.tldp.com/issue/175-6/DM.html

    Although DMSA can remove methylmercury from the brain, it does not reverse prior damage caused by methylmercury during the time it was at a toxic level. (see research report below).   DMPS is 3 times more toxic than DMSA (based on the potentially lethal dose).    DMSA is so safe that the FDA approves its use in small children with lead toxicity. DMPS is not approved by the FDA for any use .

     There are rumors that EDTA or DMSA can cause toxins to enter the brain. That is false. They cite a study of newborn mice with immature blood-brain barriers who were injected with large amounts of mercury and were also given a chelator. As would be expected, that was not enough to prevent mercury from accumulating in their tiny brains. Clinics that desire to exploit patients with inappropriate use of IV DMPS appear to be responsible for that bit of misinformation. Ask for the actual scientific data. Ask for recent data derived within the past 5 to 10 years. DMSA is a simple, inexpensive oral medicine taken at home and does not require any fees paid to the doctors office. Remember, DMSA is so safe that it has FDA approval for use in children and infants in the United States. (But prescribing oral DMSA causes loss of profits for chelation clinics using IV DMPS.)

    Developing countries in Asia and Eastern Europe with environmental disasters involving widespread contamination with toxic metals, including mercury, use DMSA by mouth to treat exposed populations.

__________________________________________

RESEARCH REPORT

Treatment of Mercury and Lead Poisonings with Dimercaptosuccinic Acid (DMSA) and Sodium Dimercaptopropanesulfonate (DMPS)

Jan Aaseth, Dag Jacobsen, Ole Andersen, Elsa WickstrØm

Analyst 1995 Mar; Vol 120, page 853ff

Presented at the fifth Nordic Symposium on Trace Elements in Human Health and Disease, Loen, Norway, June 19-20, 1994.

SUMMARY: The organic mercury species with greatest toxicity are methylmercury compounds, which have a high affinity for the brain and nervous system. DMSA is shown to cross the blood brain barrier and remove mercury from that organ. DMPS is much less effective. DMPS is also 3 times more toxic than DMSA, based on LD-50. Animal studies show DMSA to be almost 3 times more effective than DMPS in removing brain mercury, as tabulated below. DMSA has the added advantage that it is taken by mouth in capsule form. DMPS is usually given by injection.

STUDY OF MERCURY TOXIC MICE:

Brain mercury before treatment averaged 2.3 nmol/g

Brain mercury after DMPS treatment = 1.6 nmol/g

Brain mercury after DMSA treatment = 0.6 nmol/g

Author's conclusion: "DMSA may now be considered as the treatment of first choice in cases of acute or subacute lead poisoning and in mercury poisoning. All experimental and clinical experiences show a low toxicity for this drug."

*********************************

To obtain DMSA for yourself, call 1-360-458-1061 (during business hours Pacific time). Ask for Mercaptex. The usual adult dose for mercury removal is 500 mg (five 100 milligram capsules) on an empty stomach, taken when first arising in the morning with a glass of water or juice, then no food for another 45 minutes. This dose is taken 3 days per week with at least one day between each dose. Monday, Wednesday and Friday is a convenient schedule. This is continued for 2 to 3 months. Wait at least one month without DMSA before retesting blood levels of mercury to allow for equilibration within the body.

BACK