BIG trouble.

You can follow the case at http:www.boleneport.com. You can sign up there to be on the newsletter Subscriber list.

Currently Barrett has filed a Motion to Dismiss the case, but htere is little chance that will happen. His reason he wants a Dismissal? He claims he is “assisting the government…

Next comes “discovery,” a process where Barrett will have to cough up thousands of documents, then go into a video-taped Deposition where he will be forced to answer questions about his support network – those that help him get his articles on the first page of search engines.

Barrett’s lead attorney seems to have disappeared, and he has been LATE making EVERY filing deadline since the case began.

The fun has just begun.

Heterogeneity of response is a phenomena that many pay only face value to. The comparison of provoked to non-provoked urine samples begs several questions and foremost “Is this appropriate?”

Let us assume that the non-provoked reference range is taken from a ‘well’ population, this may allow us to infer that any heavy metal burden is not contributing to any acute illness states (subclinical phenomena are unlikely assessed for) thus their un-provoked urinary excretion may be viewed as representative of said population.

Using a chelating agent in a provoked test in ‘unwell’ patients will provide an insight into body burden. Comparing these findings to the un-provoked would likely suggest an ‘abnormal’ body burden. This inference may be true but is not justified by this comparison.

There is a growing body of literature implicating environmental exposure in the pathogenesis of many conditions and as such the tolerable limits for toxic metals move close towards the trace level.

I would agree that such testing is misrepresented nevertheless in a patient with suspected environmental exposure or refractory conditions identifying elevated urine toxic metals may provide indication for other therapies.

Provoked testing in ‘well’ patients would be of use in comparison of findings but would not govern the decision to administer chelation therapies.

The intricacies of metal toxicology mean that the finding of two normal provoked heavy metal urines in a well and ill patient cannot exclude the use of chelation therapy. Loss of functional reserve in the ill patient could be compromised/contributed to by heavy metal burden, tissue distribution cannot be determined from such testing when in fact it could be critical in providing explanation for signs/symptoms.

Those who criticise the application of clinical toxicology have the right to do so when it is misapplied yet when they conduct themselves in an overzealous and fanatical fashion they to violate the ‘scientific code’ to which they so vehemently claim to protect.

The comment above by Ash close by stating “typically to encourage patients to undergo dangerous and inappropriate procedures like chelation therapy”

Such is typical of the overzealous counter-position, Chelation therapy has cased deaths but in context of far commoner agents such as aspirin the numbers are insignificant.

“Since the mid-1970s, court documents and newspapers have reported at least 30 deaths associated with IV disodium EDTA”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2438277/?tool=pmcentrez

I would applaud anyone correctly criticising the inappropriate application of any therapy and I believe there are a substantial number of cases for which Mr. Ash’s comments are justified, however, to suggest that chelation therapy is dangerous is extremely loaded and inevitably misleading.

Ultimately, the reasons such issues and debates arise is because basic principles of logic are not taught in school or university and so we flounder and those who would do well with our help suffer needlessly.

*sigh*

Doctors Data toxic metals tests were especially useful as a GUIDE to how much mercury I had & how efficiently my body was eliminating it. This was supervised by a qualified professional–an ND who is NOT a quack. Mercury toxicity is a serious issue which most MDs don’t take seriously. MDs don’t have all the answers. There will always be charlatans, & many of them are MDs. Does Barrett write about them???