- Upon undergoing Angiography, Doctors diagnosed multiple blockages for which Angioplasty was ruled out and instead, suggested 'Bypass Surgery'.
- That evening, he was brought home as doctor suggested his heart being very weak, bypass can be performed only after 15 - 20 days.
- Meanwhile, whilst discussing the matter with relatives and close friends, fresh information came from a family friend.
- A new treatment known as ChelationTherapy has been introduced into the Indian medical theatre.
- With this therapy, a patient who has to undergo by-pass need not do so.
- Instead, the patient is given about 18 bottles of blood in which certain medicaments are injected. The blood cleans the system and removes all blockages from the heart and arteries. The number of bottles given may increase depending upon the age-factor and health of patient.
- Cost per bottle may be around Rs.2,500/- Treatment takes about a month.Currently, only a few doctors in India specialise in this field.
CH MAHADEVAN
Hyderabad.
"Chelation Therapy:
Unproven Claims and Unsound Theories"
Saul Green, Ph.D.
Please click below.Chelation therapy, as discussed in this article, is a series of intravenous infusions containing disodium EDTA and various other substances. It is sometimes done by swallowing EDTA or other agents in pill form. Proponents claim that EDTA chelation therapy is effective against atherosclerosis and many other serious health problems. Its use is widespread because patients have been led to believe that it is a valid alternative to established medical interventions such as coronary bypass surgery. However, there is no scientific evidence that this is so. It is also used to treat nonexistent "lead poisoning," "mercury poisoning," and other alleged toxic states that practitioners diagnose with tests on blood, urine, and/or hair.
The proponents' viewpoints have been summarized in four books: The Chelation Answer: How to Prevent Hardening of the Arteries and Rejuvenate Your Cardiovascular System (1982), by Morton Walker, D.P.M., and Garry Gordon, M.D.; Chelation Therapy: The Key to Unclogging Y our Arteries (1985), by John Parks Trowbridge, M.D., and Morton Walker D.P.M.; A Textbook on EDTA Chelation Therapy (1989), by Elmer M. Cranton, M.D.; and Bypassing Bypass: The New Technique of Chelation Therapy (2nd edition, 1990), by Elmer Cranton, M.D., and Arline Brecher. The scientific jargon in these books may create the false impression that chelation therapy for atherosclerosis, and a host of other conditions, is scientifically sound. The authors allege that between 300,000 and 500,000 patients have safely benefited. However, their evidence consists of anecdotes, testimonials, and poorly designed experiments.
This article identifies the major claims made for EDTA chelation and examines each in light of established scientific fact. The sources used for this review included position papers of professional societies, technical textbooks, research and review articles, newspaper articles, patient testimonials, medical records, legal depositions, transcripts of court testimony, privately published books, clinic brochures, and personal correspondence. [Note: Chelation with other substances has legitimate use in a few situations. For example, deferoxamine (Desferol) is used to treat iron-overload from multiple transfusions. But this is not related to the topic of this article, and chelation with disodium EDTA is not a substitute for Desferol chelation.]
Early History
The term chelate, from the Greek chele for claw, refers to the "claw-like" structure of the organic chemical ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), first synthesized in Germany in the 1930s. With this claw, EDTA binds di- and trivalent metallic ions to form a stable ring structure. EDTA is water-soluble and chelates only metallic ions that are dissolved in water. At pH 7.4 (the normal pH of blood) the strength with which EDTA binds dissolved metals, in decreasing order, is: iron+++ (ferric ion), mercury++, copper++, aluminum+++, nickel++, lead++, cobalt++, zinc++, iron++ (ferrous ion), cadmium++, manganese++, magnesium++, and calcium++.
Mercury, lead, and cadmium cannot be metabolized by the body and, if accumulated, can cause toxic effects by interfering with various physiological functions. These substances are called "heavy metals," a term applied to metallic elements whose specific gravity is about 5.0 or greater, especially those that are poisonous. Aluminum is not a nutrient, but iron, copper, nickel, cobalt, zinc, manganese, magnesium, and calcium are essential nutrients that are needed for normal metabolic activity.
After EDTA was found effective in chelating and removing toxic metals from the blood, some scientists postulated that hardened arteries could be softened if the calcium in their walls was removed. The first indication that EDTA treatment might benefit patients with atherosclerosis came from Clarke, Clarke, and Mosher, who, in 1956, reported that patients with occlusive peripheral vascular disease said they felt better after treatment with EDTA [1].
In 1960, Meltzer et al., who had studied ten patients with angina pectoris, reported that there was no objective evidence of improvement in any of them that could be ascribed to the course of EDTA chelation treatment. However, during the next two months, most of the patients began reporting unusual improvement in their symptoms. Prompted by these results, Kitchell et al. studied the effects of chelation on 28 additional patients and reappraised the course of the ten patients used in the original trial [2]. They found that although 25 of the 38 patients had exhibited improved anginal patterns and half had shown improvement in electrocardiographic patterns several months after the treatment had begun, these effects were not lasting. At the time of the report, 12 of the 38 had died and only 15 reported feeling better. (This "improvement" was not significant, however, because it was no better than would be expected with proven methods and because there was no control group for comparison.) Kitchell et al. concluded that EDTA chelation, as used in this study, was "not a useful clinical tool in the treatment of coronary disease."
The "Approved" Protocol
The primary organization promoting chelation therapy is the American College for Advancement in Medicine (ACAM), which was founded in 1973 as the American Academy for Medical Preventics. Since its inception, ACAM's focus has been the promotion of chelation therapy. The group conducts courses, sponsors the American Journal of Advancement in Medicine, and administers a "board certification" program that is not recognized by the scientific community. ACAM's online directory lists about 850 members, about 550 of whom indicate that they practice chelation therapy.
In 1989, an ACAM protocol for "the safe and effective administration of EDTA chelation therapy" was included in Cranton's "textbook," a 420-page special issue of the journal that contains 28 articles and a foreword by Linus Pauling. The protocol calls for intravenous infusion of 500 to 1,000 ml of a solution containing 50 mg of disodium EDTA per kilogram of body weight, plus heparin, magnesium chloride, a local anesthetic (to prevent pain at the infusion site), several B-vitamins, and 4 to 20 grams of vitamin C. This solution is infused slowly over 3.5 to 4 hours, one to three times a week. The initial recommendation is about 30 such treatments, with the possibility of additional ones later. Additional vitamins, minerals, and other substancesprescribed orally"vary according to preferences of both patients and physicians." Lifestyle modification, which includes stress reduction, caffeine avoidance, alcohol limitation, smoking cessation, exercise, and nutritional counseling, is encouraged as part of the complete therapeutic program. The number of treatments to achieve "optimal therapeutic benefit" for patients with symptomatic disease is said to range from 20 ("minimum"), 30 (usually needed), or 40 ("not uncommon" before benefit is reported") to as many as 100 or more over a period of several years. "Full benefit does not normally occur for up to 3 months after a series is completed," the protocol statesand "follow-up treatments may be given once or twice monthly for long-term maintenance, to sustain improvement and to prevent recurrence of symptoms." The cost, typically $75 to $125 per treatment, is not covered by most insurance companies. Some chelationists, in an attempt to secure coverage for their patients, misstate on their insurance claims that they are treating heavy-metal poisoning.
In 1997, ACAM issued a revised protocol describing the same procedures but adding circumstances (contraindications) under which chelation should not be performed. As in 1989, the document gives no criteria for determining: (1) who should be treated, (2) how much treatment should be given, or (3) how to tell whether the treatment is working.
Unproven Claims
Proponents claim that chelation therapy is effective against atherosclerosis, coronary heart disease, and peripheral vascular disease. Its supposed benefits include increased collateral blood circulation; decreased blood viscosity; improved cell membrane function; improved intracellular organelle function; decreased arterial vasospasm; decreased free radical formation; inhibition of the aging process; reversal of atherosclerosis; decrease in angina; reversal of gangrene; improvement of skin color, healing of diabetic ulcers. Proponents also claim that chelation is effective against arthritis; multiple sclerosis; Parkinson's disease; psoriasis; Alzheimer's disease; and problems with vision, hearing, smell, muscle coordination, and sexual potency. None of these claimed benefits has been demonstrated by well-designed clinical trials.
In a retrospective study of 2,870 patients treated with NaMgEDTA, Olszewer and Carter (1989) concluded that EDTA chelation therapy benefited patients with cardiac disease, peripheral vascular disease and cerebrovascular disease. These conclusions were not justified because the people who received the treatment were not compared to people who did not.
In 1990, these authors carried out a "double-blind study" in which EDTA chelation was used to treat ten patients with peripheral vascular disease. The authors claimed that this was the first such study. The patients' progress was evaluated by measuring changes in their blood pressure and their performance in exercise stress tests before, during, and after the course of treatment. The authors claimed that EDTA had a significant impact on the patients' clinical status because the removal of calcium, copper and zinc from the vascular compartment corrected cholesterol and lipoprotein metabolism; triggered a parathyroid response that pulled calcium from the bones; decreased platelet aggregation; lessened iron-generated free radical formation; reduced membrane lipid peroxidation; decreased plaque formation; and prevented intracellular calcium accumulation.
Between 1963 and 1985, independent physicians published at least fifteen separate reports documenting the case histories of more than seventy patients who had received chelation treatments. They found no evidence of change in the atherosclerotic disease process, no decrease in the size of atherosclerotic plaques, and no evidence that narrowed arteries opened wider.
More recently, the results of two randomized, controlled, double-blind clinical trials of chelation therapy were published in peer-reviewed German medical journals. The first was conducted by Curt Diehm, M.D., at the University of Heidelberg Medical Clinic [3]. Diehm studied 45 patients who had intermittent claudication, a condition in which impaired circulation causes the individual to develop pain in the legs upon walking. About half of the patients were treated with EDTA and the rest received Bencyclan, a bloodthinning agent. In addition to determining the effect of each agent on the ability to perform pain-free walking exercises, Diehm measured the progress of the disease process in each patient during the four-week treatment period and three months after treatment was stopped. Statistical evaluation of the results after the blinding code was broken showed that patients in both groups had equally increased ability to perform pain-free walking exercises and that treatment with EDTA did not result in any change in the patients' blood flow, red cell viscosity, red-cell aggregation, or triglyceride and cholesterol levels. Diehm also concluded that the improvements in walking measurements in both groups were directly related to his success in convincing them of his strong interest in their well being and his ability to motivate them to make an effort to perform greater activity.
In the second trial, R. Hopf, a cardiologist at the University of Frankfurt, tested chelation in patients with coronary heart disease [4]. In this trial, 16 patients with angiographic evidence of coronary heart disease were randomized and divided into an EDTA-treated and an untreated group. Before treatment, the treated group averaged 2.1 significantly narrowed coronary arteries, while the untreated group averaged 2.6. Patients were infused with 500 ml of either the EDTA solution or dilute salt water (a placebo) at three-day intervals for a total of 20 infusions. On completion of the trial, patients in both groups said they felt better and performed weightlifting tests equally well. However, comparison of both groups before and after treatment, using angiography and other tests, indicated no improvement in blood flow through the patients' coronary arteries and a slight progression of their atherosclerosis. Hopf concluded that chelation had no effect on diseased coronary arteries."
Loving regards.
C H Mahadevan