QUESTION: I have a 2 year old with Lead poisoning and I want to detox him 10 Dec 2008 USA

I have a 2 year old with Lead poisoning and I want to detox him, how do I go about that process?

Thanks,

Wendy

ANSWER: 11 Dec 2008

Dear Wendy,

You have not filled in the fields in the form on our website which tell me where you are so I'm forced to assume by the way you have spelled mum as "mom" and the aol email address that you are living in North America or at least originally from North America.

Your question is a good one. You are asking about tertiary prevention of lead poisoning - that is, preventing the lead that is already in your two year old from harming him later in life.

The official policy coming from all the doctors and professors on The LEAD Group's Technical Advisory Board is that apart from nutritional intervention and secondary lead poisoning prevention (ie identifying sources and removing the sources or removing the person from the sources - in order to prevent further poisoning), nothing else can safely be done for a lead poisoned person unless they need chelation because the blood lead level of a child is above 45 µg/dL or of an adult is above 70 µg/dL. This position is well-supported by the following guidance documents from the United States - the centre of the universe when it comes to lead poisoning prevention policies:

1. Chapter 3. Medical Assessment and Interventions Prepared by James R. Roberts, MD, MPH, and J. Routt Reigart, MD. Table 3.1. Summary of Recommendations for Children with Confirmed (Venous) Elevated Blood Lead Levels, and Table 3.4. Schedule for Follow-Up Blood Lead Testing in "Managing Elevated Blood Lead Levels Among Young Children: Recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention" (also accessible via www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/CaseManagement/caseManage_main.htm)

Table 1. Health-Based Management Recommendations for Lead-Exposed Adults and Table Table 2. Health-Based Medical Surveillance Recommendations for Lead-Exposed Workers From Recommendations for Medical Management of Adult Lead Exposure by Michael J. Kosnett; Richard P. Wedeen; Stephen J. Rothenberg; Karen L. Hipkins; Barbara L. Materna; Brian S. Schwartz; Howard Hu; and Alan Woolf, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (US) (11/4/07)

However, apart from myself, the members of the Technical Advisory Board don't sit here all day answering enquiries about what ELSE can be done. So, I have the pragmatic approach that, IF you can find a doctor you trust (preferably one who has experience treating lead poisoned people), then you should work with them to further manage the blood lead level and possibly get some of the lead out of the body, in the hope that you might do no harm and you might reduce the risks of the various adverse health effects associated with elevated blood lead levels.

To this end, I have noted in the database, every doctor who has ever been of use to one of our inquirers, and I advise people to see one of these doctors as well as any doctor trained by the American College for Advancement in Medicine (ACAM) or the Society for Orthomolecular Health Medicine (OHM) to carry out chelation therapy and/or urine chelation challenge testing. For example, according to orthomolecular.org "Orthomolecular medicine describes the practice of preventing and treating disease by providing the body with optimal amounts of substances which are natural to the body." At http://orthomolecular.org/resources/pract.shtml you will find orthomolecular practitioners who have requested to be listed on the website. They may be physicians, other members of health professions or counsellors.

The Society for Orthomolecular Health Medicine (OHM) website includes http://orthomolecular.org/resources/pract.shtml#us and the occasional practitioner in the US country list there mentions chelation.

ACAM is a medical society devoted to the education of medical professionals. Go to http://www.acamnet.org/site/c.ltJWJ4MPIwE/b.5457489/k.60DF/Welcome_to_PhysicianLink
__18005323688_/apps/kb/cs/contactsearch.asp for the searchable list of doctors trained to administer chelation therapy.

Once a person has been found to be lead poisoned, isotopic fingerprinting is an invaluable tool in identifying the mine source and to an extent the pathways of the lead exposure. See for example "Report on Lead Isotopic Analyses of Samples Associated with the Esperance Lead Investigation" by Access Macquarie Limited: Professor Brian Gulson & Michael Korsch, CSIRO Division of Petroleum Resources. 

Lastly, having advised so many people who have to deal with lead poisoning, I have found that many of them benefit from being in an egroup with other people who are in a similar situation. Egroup members can email all the other members via one simple email address, and ask each other questions and relate their case histories in order to get support and advice on whatever issues are relevant at the moment. The following egroup has been set up for this purpose and you are very welcome to go to the website and join (using your YahooID):

Leaded Kids egroup for parents, teachers, doctors, carers of lead poisoned children http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/LeadedKids/

Alternatively, if you don't have a YahooID (it is free to get one) and don't want to get one, you can contact me and I will happily join you up to this one or any of our other egroups (see the full list at egroups).

I hope all this helps and I look forward to hearing of your progress.

Yours Sincerely

Elizabeth O’Brien