What is chelation therapy and how does it work?
Chelation therapy is a treatment that uses medicine to remove these metals so they don't make you sick. Some alternative health care providers also use it to treat heart disease, autism, and...
What are the basics of chelation therapy?
Feb 07, 2022 · The History of Chelation Therapy. The word chelation comes from the Greek word chelos, meaning claw. The word claw refers to how metals in the body may bind to the chelating agent in a claw-like manner. First used clinically in 1956 to treat patients with lead poisoning, chelation therapy is an established, effective treatment for patients suffering from metal …
What are the health benefits of chelation therapy?
Apr 11, 2022 · Chelation is a chemical process in which a substance is used to bind metals or minerals so they can be excreted from the body. Chelation has uses in conventional medicine, such as treating iron overload or severe lead poisoning.
What diseases can be treated with chelation therapy?
Chelation therapy is a chemical procedure involving injecting a synthetic solution called EDTA (ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid) into the circulation to remove heavy metals and minerals from the body. Chelation is a verb that means “to grasp” or “to bind.”.
What is chelation therapy good for?
When metals like lead, mercury, iron, and arsenic build up in your body, they can be toxic. Chelation therapy is a treatment that uses medicine to remove these metals so they don't make you sick. Some alternative health care providers also use it to treat heart disease, autism, and Alzheimer's disease.Mar 19, 2021
What are the side effects of chelation therapy?
Side effects of chelation treatment may include headaches, rash, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. The treatment may remove vital minerals from the body along with the toxic metals.
What is the process of chelation?
Chelation therapy is a chemical process in which a synthetic solution EDTA is injected into the bloodstream in order to remove heavy metals from the body. Chelation is a chemical process where a chemical complex strongly attracts a mineral forming a stable compound.Aug 9, 2021
What is chelation therapy example?
Chelation therapy involves injecting a type of medication called a chelator or chelating agent. Some common chelators include ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), dimercaptosuccinic acid, and dimercaprol. Some chelators are better at removing certain metals than others are.
How do you flush heavy metals out of your body?
Sometimes you might need to have your stomach pumped to get the metals out. If your poisoning is serious, one treatment option is chelation. You get drugs, usually through an IV needle, that go into your blood and “stick” to the heavy metals in your body. They then get flushed out with your pee.Sep 27, 2020
What is a natural chelating agent?
Green chelates/Natural chelating agents are biodegradable materials mainly used for washing or cleaning. These materials are primarily used in Laundry, surface care, detergents, and homecare. Common chelating agents are poorly biodegradable and there are concerns about their environmental effects.
What are the symptoms of heavy metals in the body?
Common symptoms across several types of heavy metal poisoning include:diarrhea.nausea.abdominal pain.vomiting.shortness of breath.tingling in your hands and feet.chills.weakness.Dec 13, 2018
How long does it take to detox heavy metals from the body?
According to various studies that heavy metal chelation using cilantro and chlorella can naturally remove an average of 87% of lead, 91% of mercury, and 74% of aluminum from the body within 45 days.Mar 10, 2019
What kind of doctor treats heavy metal toxicity?
If intentional ingestion or overdose is suspected, place the patient in a closely monitored unit, screen for coingestion of acetaminophen, and consult a medical toxicologist and psychiatrist.Dec 31, 2020
What is the most common chelating agent?
Calcium disodium ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid (CaNa2EDTA) is the most commonly used chelating agent.
Can EDTA unclog arteries?
Atherosclerosis. Evidence that EDTA chelation therapy is effective for heart disease is mixed. Proponents believe it may help people with atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) or peripheral vascular disease (decreased blood flow to the legs) by clearing clogged arteries and improving blood flow.Aug 5, 2015
What is chelation therapy?
Chelation therapy is a treatment that uses medicine to remove these metals so they don't make you sick. Some alternative health care providers also use it to treat heart disease, autism, and Alzheimer's disease. But there's very little evidence it works for those conditions. In fact, chelation therapy can cause serious side effects -- ...
Can chelation therapy cause low calcium levels?
This can lead to a deficiency in these important substances. Some people who’ve had chelation therapy also have low calcium levels in the blood and kidney damage . Things To Watch For.
Is chelation therapy safe for autism?
One child with the condition died after having this treatment. The AAP doesn' t recommend using chelation therapy for autism, except in a clinical trial. Alzheimer's Disease.
Can Alzheimer's disease be reversed?
In patients who have this, abnormal proteins called tau and beta amyloid build up in the brain and damage it. To date, no treatment can stop or reverse this disease. Some researchers think that a buildup of metals like copper, iron, and zinc might also play a role in Alzheimer's disease.
Does EDTA remove plaque?
Artery plaques contain calcium. The chelating drug disodium EDTA binds to this mineral. The idea is that chelation therapy clears it out of the blood vessels. It removes plaques, too. In 2002, the National Institutes of Health did a big study on chelation therapy, called TACT.
Does chelation help with heart disease?
Some natural health care providers and supplement companies claim they use chelation therapy to reduce symptoms of autism, Alzheimer's disease, or heart disease. Yet this treatment is only approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat metal poisoning.
What to do if you are considering chelation therapy?
If you’re considering chelation therapy for coronary disease, discuss it first with your cardiologist or other health care provider. Seek out and consider information available from scientific studies on the therapy.
What are the side effects of chelation?
Can chelation therapy have side effects? 1 Yes. The most important serious side effects are hypocalcemia (abnormally low blood calcium levels) and damage to the kidneys. 2 In the TACT study, which had extensive safety monitoring, 16 percent of people receiving chelation and 15 percent of people receiving the placebo stopped their infusions because of an adverse event. Four of those events were serious; two were in the chelation group (one death) and two were in the placebo group (one death).
How long does disodium EDTA last?
A course of treatment can require 20 to 40 weekly in fusions lasting several hours each. Patients also typically take high-dose pills of vitamins and minerals.
Does chelation therapy reduce cardiovascular risk?
Overall, chelation therapy produced a modest reduction in cardiovascular events. However, further analysis showed that the beneficial effect occurred only in people with diabetes. People with diabetes, who made up about one-third of the participants, had a 41 percent overall reduction in the risk of any cardiovascular event;
What is chelation therapy?
Chelation therapy is a proven way to treat heavy metal poisoning, including lead or mercury poisoning. The FDA claims this therapy is among the most effective heavy metal toxicity treatments there is—perhaps the only one.3 National Health Statistics data reveal that over 100,000 Americans receive chelation each year. 3
What are the side effects of chelation?
Even in low doses, I’ve seen that side effects like high blood pressure, headache, and low blood sugar may occur in certain patients. To mitigate these symptoms, the following tests should always be performed before and after chelation therapy: 1 Cholesterol and other blood compound tests 2 Blood sugar and other nutritional tests 3 Blood pressure and circulation tests 4 Kidney and organ function tests
How often should I do chelation?
It’s also worth noting that intravenous chelation should not be administered more than once in a 24-hour period, and that two to three treatments per week are typical. Most importantly, just like with any medical treatment, chelation therapy should only be performed by a qualified professional such as myself.
Does mercury accumulate in the body?
This means mercury will accumulate in the body over time.1 And often, we don’t even know when we’re ingesting it. Mercury, after all, is present in seafood like swordfish and tuna. Additionally, each amalgam or silver-colored dental filling releases an average of 10mcg of mercury into the bloodstream each day. 2.
Can amalgam fillings be replaced?
But fortunately, amalgam fillings can be replaced. And mercury buildup can be mitigated by way of chelation therapy. Ultimately, if we don’t manage the buildup of mercury in the body, our risk of facing negative health conditions will continue to rise.1 Chelation therapy, however, is a proven way to remove heavy metals from ...
Does chelation help Alzheimer's?
The treatment has been shown to remove aluminum from the brain. (Aluminum is often linked to Alzheimer’s disease.) What’s more, in How Metal Poisoning Can Affect Your Brain, Drs. H. Richard Casdorph and Morton Walker share that chelation therapy may help the elderly improve their memory, mental clarity, and overall IQ. The treatment can also serve as a de-locking agent for clogged blood vessels in the brain and body
Does chemo help with cancer?
Chelation therapy helps to manage free radicals, which are associated with the cellular destruction that may contribute to cancer. Since the procedure eliminates heavy metals from the body—some of which are tied to cancer in large quantities—they are currently investigating whether it can have a significant impact on cancer prevention.
What are the side effects of chelation therapy?
The most common is burning at the IV site. Other side effects include fever, headache, nausea or vomiting. Rare but serious complications of chelation therapy for heart disease that have been reported include: Abnormally low blood-calcium levels (hypocalcemia) Sudden drop in blood pressure.
Can chelation therapy be used for heart disease?
Chelation therapy has long been used as a treatment for mercury and lead poisoning, but it isn't a proven treatment for heart disease. It can potentially cause serious side effects when used as a heart disease treatment. Even so, some doctors and complementary health practitioners have used chelation therapy to treat heart disease and stroke.
Process
- In chelation therapy, a chelating agent is introduced into the body through an intravenous (IV) drip or oral pill. Once it enters the bloodstream, the agent binds to certain molecules (such as metals or minerals) and is removed from the body through urination, carrying those molecules …
Conditions Treated
- Although the FDA has only approved prescription chelation therapy for metal poisoning, some health professionals have used chelation therapy for other ailments. A common belief of proponents of chelation therapy is that it can aid in treating atherosclerosis (i.e., hardening of the arteries). Since calcium deposits are found in artery-clogging plaques, some practitioners argue …
Who Does It
- Any licensed physician can perform chelation therapy on a patient. However, chelation therapy for uses other than metal toxicity is not conventionally taught in medical school, and physicians who perform it generally are naturopathic doctorsor medical doctors who receive specialized training for it.
Evidence
- The scientific support for chelation therapy's benefits for health conditions other than metal poisoning is limited. There is a consensus that much more research is needed in this area. For example, one comprehensive review of studies on chelation therapy and heart health concluded that there was insufficient evidence to determine whether chelation therapy is effective or not.1…
Side Effects & Safety Concerns
- A major reason chelation therapy is not widely accepted for conditions other than metal poisoning is due to the risk of side effects, which is significant. Side effects can especially occur when higher doses are used, and include:15 1. Diarrhea 2. Weight loss 3. High blood pressure 4. Abdominal pain 5. Gastrointestinal disorders 6. Nausea 7. Skin rash 8. Vomiting 9. Flu-like symp…
A Word from Verywell
- Chelation therapy has been effective in treating metal poisoning, but its efficacy in treating other conditions is unclear. Be sure you talk to your doctor and understand the risks of chelation therapy if you are interested in receiving it.