Mercury is a destructive neurotoxin. The good news is that it can be removed from your body. The bad news is that the detoxification needs to be done with care, to avoid causing more problems. The first step is to find the mercury source, whether it is from dental amalgams or from consuming contaminated seafood.  After you find out the source, you can remove the dental amalgam (if that is the case), and start your detoxification.

The Mercury Test

One of the best experts in the heavy metal detoxification is Chris Shade, Ph.D. He studies environmental transformations of mercury at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He developed a patented liquid technology that can identify the source of the mercury in your body.

In the human body, glutathione is a dominant agent that can bind to mercury and will help move it out of your tissue (and other heavy metals). By efficiently eliminating mercury out of your body you correctly mobilize and push the mercury out.

Chris Shade has developed a mercury test call Mercury Tri-Test. This test uses three different types of samples: blood, urine, and hair. Most of the time, there is more mercury in the tissue than in the blood. The best excretion marker for the methylmercury is hair, while the best one for inorganic mercury is urine.  The levels of mercury in urine, hair, and blood have a steady state (are directly proportional with one another).

The blood to urine ratio

The reason for this ration is to find the level of toxicity. If two people have five amalgams, the one sicker of the two is the one whose urine output of mercury is lower. This is due to the damage done to the active transport system located in the proximal tubules of nephrons. If the ratio in your blood rises above 1:7 the ratio of urine, it means the proximal tubules in your kidneys are extremely damaged.  Everything in your blood is filtered by your kidneys.

The difference between methylmercury and inorganic mercury

With the help of the Mercury tri-test developed by Chris Shade, you will find out which type of mercury you have into your body, whether if it is methylmercury (from fish) or if it is inorganic mercury (found in amalgam fillings). This will allow you to have an appropriate detoxification protocol, based on the precise analysis.

Many doctors treat mercury infections the same way. But this is bad because inorganic mercury is more toxic to the extracellular matrix. If you suffer from joint problems or pain, you should go to the doctor to find out if your kidney transportation is working normally and if you need a detoxification.

Methylmercury is less toxic to the cells, but if you have it in your body, it will go to your liver and your GI tract.

Mercury exposure sources

One of the most common sources of methylmercury is the seafood.  If you are consuming a lot of seafood, you could get seriously ill.  A shark can have 4 – 10 ppm (parts per million) methylmercury in its tissue. A swordfish has between 1-5 ppm and tuna between 1-2 ppm. But the smaller the fish, the less mercury they have. For example, sardines contain 1-10 ppb (parts per billion) of methylmercury.

Most inorganic mercury comes from dental amalgam and the breakdown of fish-based mercury into inorganic form. The third largest source of mercury is the airborne mercury which comes from older buildings.

Mercury causes a lot of damage to the kidneys and tends to build up there. The more mercury you have in your kidneys, the more damage it will do. And if the kidneys don’t work properly they will accumulate more mercury, causing inflammation damage around the kidney. As a result, it can cause chronic renal insufficiency. That is why you should go through a heavy metal detoxification.

For more information about heavy metal detoxification, ask your doctor and dentist.