mercury/heavy metal poisoning/chealation???

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I keep running into articles and stuff mentioning a possible connection between mercury poisoning and autism/asperger's/ADHD/ etc. What have you run across, what are your thoughts, any experience with chealation? I am beginning to really wonder about the connections that seem to be made. Immune problems, allergies, bowel problems, eczema, lots of antibiotic use, immunizations.....

I read an article in Discover magazine about toxins and autism. I then looked at the Generation Rescue site and was looking at autism news stuff.

Thoughts, anyone?

I just had a screening done, and I have a high bismuth reading. Not mercury. Don't know what that indicates. I've got a mate who's a naturopath, and hopefully he'll be able to enlighten me.
By the way, it wasn't a scary sort of test. (A 24 hour urine sample.)

There is no credible evidence that show a causal relationship between thimersol and autism. I have talked to and posted with parents that claim chelation (a process where you allegedly remove the toxin) works, but I have never heard how or how much. I have only seen, "he's improved so much" or "There is so much heavy metal coming out of him". But no evidence that there's any cognitive, or other other neurological difference.
Chelation is done by alternative practioners that either do their own labwork, send it to a like-minded lab.

I don't doubt that environmental factors have had a hand in altering our DNA, we know it does. But there is no true increase in autism and no "epidemic" or any other medical emergencies going on in relation to mercury.

I don't understand what this list is, it's quite varied and unrelated.

How someone has AS or lower austism is still not known. But on chealation i saw a debate on uctv were doing it on ppl with AS did not cause mecury to come out but it did on those with lower level ausism. This still does not mean it works. It did not change them. There are lots of idea about what makes it possibable none so far have the 90 percent plus needed to maybe be what can make it happen and if there is anything that can be done to prevent it.

My son had a terrible time with his vaccines, fever over 103 and such, everytime he got them, would not come down under 102 for days! Maybe it was them afterall?

Except, that does not really explain me, the fact I seem to be AS too. Or my mother, who also shows strong signs of AS. Or all the other "older" people, like her siblings, and my father, who also show strong signs of AS. Maybe vaccinations play a very small role in it, they are a "trigger" for those who have some underlying condition, but I don't think they are the root cause.

If you look at places like the silicon valley, with extraordinarly high rates of ASD, and the only thing different seems to be the place if filled with computer programers, the genetics really do seem to make more sense.

Best wishes!

I agree, genetics do seem to play a part. When I read about some of the studies what they seem to be saying makes sense. I remember looking into some of this a couple years ago and even since then there seems to be more information, more people willing to try stuff, more people to talk to who have tried it.

It is so hard to know what to believe....
I am courious though...

KimJ,

If I understood correctly, chealation is a treatment used to treat people with heavy metal poisoning, it has been used to treat people who have had accitdents while working with toxic metals. It is not just an "alternative" treatment, but does have legitmate use in the medical world.

Chelation is used in "real" medicine - but the alternative practitioners are not using it that way. There was a recent article also about the concern of using lead chelators (for the supposed mercury) on kids who do not have lead in their system. The chelators effect the body and the speculation is can it do some damage. They don't even chelate lead out of people unless it is at a certain level because chelation is considered invasive so benefit must outweigh risk. There is even argument among those who tout chelation as to what are good/bad methods.

I didn't care for the Discovery article and others in the autism community felt it was irresponsible to promote some of this stuff.

Walk-in-the-rain clarified what I said. You are bringing up chelation in the context of treating autism, I answered that. If I had an accident and had heavy metal poisoning, I would go to the hospital where I'd be treated and monitored by hospital staff. However, people seek autism treatments with alternative doctors in alternative clinics where they do the chelation treatments there with questionable lab workups and questionable monitoring.

I understand about questionable methods and practices, but what if there is/was somekind of connection between some autistic/asperger's/ADHD/spectrum symptoms and toxins? Wouldn't you want to do something about it if you could? I guess I could just wait and see what happens in the medical field.....

Has anyone else on this forum had levels checked or thier children checked?

There was a list of families you could contact to talk to about their experiences, I think I might try to do this to see what they have to say at least. I'll let you know...

If there were a reliable study done to show that pervasive autistic traits were due to some poisoning, I'd go to the doctor to check our levels. However, the anti-vaccine trend is relatively new and they are blaming vaccines for recent autism diagnoses. This same crowd denies that there are autistic adults even when you point them out. It's a whole "thing", you know? A whole clash of cultures, and I believe it effects how parents treat their kids, when they treat them as diseased.
As I said, I know parents that have chelated their kids and I have seen no tangible difference in their neurological function. That's a lot of time subjecting kids to unnecessary, unproven and uncomfortable procedures. Kids aren't lab rats.
We spent a long time teaching my son communication skills, social skills and other facets of daily living and he is now doing really well. I wouldn't have known to do that if I were concentrating on therapies, treatments and chasing down DAN! doctors.

The CDC spent years studying it and found no correlation between AS and vaccines.

My feelings about this topic really vary. I live VERY nearby the folks who started the TACA Now website - and I have met their children. I'm sorry, but they HAVE improved. Significantly. There was one child who had absolutely no speech whatsoever at two, and now at the age of 6 has completely lost his autism diagnosis. Others have gone from no speech to being in regular classrooms at school. How'd that happen? Is it even possible? Is it due to chelating? Did they develop Autism from vaccines? I'm no doctor - but if I had a child that was as severe as some of these folks did at one point, I'd have tried everything under the sun, and I'm not going to find fault with anyone else who has. The fact is - my son has AS, and definitely nowhere near as severe as some of these kids who had severe autism, and I'm happy to have him exactly the way he is. He may be goofy sometimes, but he's my son.

For every single study I've read directly from the CDC or the medical community at large about the lack of evidence of the vaccine connection within Autism - I can find 5 more that show that it does. I think it's all a matter of what you want to believe. I also have to consider the fact that if there were indeed a true correlation between the two - that could create a huge mess for the medical community. I've read that although Thimersol is no longer used in vaccines - there is still mercury of some form or another present in the vaccines. Do I know that for sure? Of course not - but it does make you stop and at least take notice. I also tend to think that if mercury is really the issue - you'd have to have a pretty early diagnosis for your child in order for chelating to truly work. I mean, my son is 7 - and I truly believe that starting something like chelating now would be almost cruel, because it's been far too long in his system.

As for the list -Immune problems, allergies, bowel problems, eczema, lots of antibiotic use, immunizations..... - this is a list of similar symptoms that many of the TACA Now families have found within their children. My son has eczema - but so does my daughter, and the only trouble my son ever had with his vaccines was that one time, he ran a fever. (at that appointment, he'd had 4 vaccines, including his MMR) My son also has allergies, just like me - but nothing that would cause me to think anything odd about it.

As I've learned more and more about Aspergers and even ASD in general - I've found one thing for certain: there are two camps - those that believe that vaccines have played a part, and those that do not and feel it's largely genetic. There seems to be a huge chasm in between the two groups, which is a shame because really - I think a lot of people, such as myself, tend to believe it's probably a little of both.

You can "not like" what you read in various articles and things - but I think it's very important for the information to at least be brought forth so that conversations can be started between doctors, parents and patients. I think it's worth being informed.

Was it in their interests to find a correlation?

I know, that is somehow a bigbrother statement, but to a certain extent, I think we do live in a world where I don't put much past govenment...

Still though, I don't think there is very much of a connection if any. It seems to me, just too many families who have children with AS, have a lot of people in the family that have at least ASD traits, if they are not indeed, fully blown Auties.

KimJ,

What you are saying makes sense. I guess what I am wondering about with my own family is are there connections between some of my sons health issues and his autistic traits or are they separate things to be dealt with separately. My son has had problems with his bowels since he was little. He has cramping and constipation. He seems to crave sugary foods and carbs. He has lots of allergies and had bad exzema when he was small. My husband who has several asperger like traits but is undiagnosed at this time also had always had bowel problems and lots of allergies. Could there be some kind of connection? When I read through some of the theories about the mercury and and also the measles vaccine (which does not have the thermerasol) but may effect bowels and absorption it made sense to me. I am not saying that they are right. It just made me very curious. Are those people just hopeful liars? What is a person to believe? How do you find out what is myth and what is fact? Where do you go? Who do you trust?

I think you do exactly what you're doing right now, Amoseli. You read, you decide for yourself, and then you research.


Interestingly enough - my son craves carbs and sugary foods ALL the time. I always thought it was because he's like my dad - who is diabetic. I never thought of the connection, but I'm in the camp that thinks there's far too many coincidences for it to be purely genetic. I still say I'm in the middle somewhere.

I had no speech at 2. At age 6, I was considered "gifted."

No one has been able to establish a cause and effect. Many autistic kids improve with no intervention and some never improve with intense intervention. I watched many autistic kids grow up. Every parent wants deperately to believe in something.