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and will no longer be freely available. Further, Codex will
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| Chelation Gains Foothold In
Oh, Canada! |
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Complementary & Alternative Medical Approach under
study in Canada to see if Chelation will unclog arteries... |
Date: 6 May 07
An Ottawa doctor is running a clinical trial for a heart
disease therapy that has been used in North America for more
than 50 years, but is considered by many physicians to
provide no health benefits.
Although data recently released from Statistics Canada
showed that instances of heart disease are decreasing, it is
still responsible for a large percentage of deaths. Of the
approximately quarter of a million Canadians who died in
2004, nearly a third succumbed to heart disease.
Traditional heart medicines include ASA, beta blockers,
statins and ACE inhibitors. But as many as 100,000 Canadians
have tried an alternative treatment called chelation
therapy. There is, however, little clinical evidence to
prove it effectively treats heart disease something Dr.
Richard Nahas, founder of the Seekers Centre for Integrative
Medicine, hopes to remedy.
I've seen a lot of patients who feel that it has changed
their lives, said Dr. Nahas, an Ottawa native and former ER
doctor.
There is no solid evidence that it works, he said. That's
what the studies for.
Dr. Nahas is looking for 100 people who are at least 50
years old and have suffered a heart attack to participate in
the clinical trial. Participants will receive regular
intravenous infusions of an amino acid called EDTA over 28
months.
The study is part of a large-scale, five-year clinical trail
sponsored by The National Center for Complementary and
Alternative Medicine, a member of the National Institutes of
Health in the U.S. It is being conducted at more than 100
sites in the U.S. and 21 in Canada. The centers goal is to
enroll 2,300 people in the study, called the Trial to Assess
Chelation Therapy (TACT), which began in 2002.
Dr. Jean-Claude Tardif, an associate professor of medicine
at the Montreal Heart Institute and the lead Canadian
investigator for the trial, says 1,000 patients have already
been recruited. He says the study will answer an important
question on the effects of chelation therapy.
Chelation therapy has long been used to treat heavy metal
poisoning, a condition where metals such as lead, iron or
mercury have reached toxic levels in the body. When EDTA
enters the body, it chelates, or binds, with toxic heavy
metals to form a water-soluble compound that is excreted in
urine.
Some doctors, such as Dr. Nahas, believe it is possible that
chelation therapy could also remove the calcium deposits
that build up in coronary arteries. The accumulation of
calcium hardens and narrows arteries and can impede blood
flow to the heart. This leads to a condition called ischemic
heart disease, which can result in a heart attack and damage
to the hearts muscles.
But according to a 2002 University of Calgary study
published in the Journal of the American Medical
Association, there is no evidence to support a beneficial
effect of chelation therapy in patients with ischemic heart
disease
My personal feeling is that it probably won’t help. In my
mind, it doesn’t make sense, said Dr. Merril Knudtson, a
cardiologist and professor of medicine at the University of
Calgary who helped run the trial. I don’t think it's a given
that calcium by itself is the culprit.
Chelation proponents have criticized the Calgary trial
because it had only 84 participants. Dr. Knudtson says the
criticisms have merit, as the scope of the trial was narrow.
He welcomes the new trial, saying he doesn’t want to be
perceived as an anti-chelation hawk.
Any research into new ways of helping sufferers of heart
disease is welcome, says Dr. Knudtson: That’s progress. We
should all be doing that.
But he does have concerns. First, he believes some people
who choose to undergo chelation therapy will stop taking
treatments that have been scientifically proven to be
effective. Then threes the cost: about $5,000 for the 30 to
40 infusions the treatment requires.
I don’t think there's a plot to blow chelation therapy out
of the water, said Dr. Knudtson. But there should be strong
clinical evidence before we ask people to spend money on it.
Dr. Nahas, who treated SARS patients in Toronto during the
2003 outbreak, says many physicians are reluctant to
recommend alternative medicines like chelation therapy. And
while doctors are good at treating certain diseases, he
says, there are still many people suffering from chronic
illnesses who are not being treated effectively.
For two years after his SARS experience, Dr. Nahas traveled
throughout more than 30 countries in South America, Asia and
Europe and studied many alternative medical practices,
including Shamanism and Ayurveda, an ancient Indian system
of health care. He opened the Seekers Centre, located on
Deakin Street, six months ago.
The National Center for Complementary and Alternative
Medicine was founded in October 1998. It received
approximately $120 million in funding from the U.S.
government last year.
The centre is also recruiting participants for many other
clinical trials, including yoga as a treatment for insomnia,
gemcitabine combined with mistletoe in treating patients
with advanced solid tumors and healing touch and immunity in
advanced cervical cancer patients.
Source: Ottawa Citizen |
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