Most people don't associate natural medicine with intravenous therapy, but these leading-edge protocols can sometimes be very powerful ways to heal the body. We have adopted specific techniques that have been used with success by physicians in Europe and the US and we make them available to patients in the Seekers Centre under the supervision of a physician.

Chelation Therapy

Chelation is a word that describes the binding of metals in the body. For almost a century, EDTA has been used to chelate calcium and lead in blood vessels to treat heart disease, stroke and other problems with circulation.

The most satisfying experience we have with chelation is with patients with major symptoms of poor circulation. We have many patients who have completely eliminated chest pain due to angina and leg pains due to intermittent claudication. These are patients who could not walk without pain - and who now lead completely normal lives. We have also treated severe foot and lower leg infections and ulcers in people with diabetes.

We also administer EDTA chelation therapy to people who have suffered a heart attack or stroke, even if they do not experience symptoms. This is because plaque buildup in one set of arteries is a virtual guarantee that circulation is extremely poor in many other parts of the body. By improving blood vessel health, we believe chelation improves kidney, liver and brain function, exercise capacity and overall well-being.

We are involved in the Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT), an NIH-sponsored clinical trial evaluating EDTA chelation in people over 50 who have suffered a heart attack. We are currently recruiting patients with the Ottawa Heart Institute. If you are interested in TACT, ask your Heart Instutute cardiologist for a referral.

Heavy Metal Detoxification

Another treatment we have a strong interest in is the use of EDTA and DMPS to chelate toxic metals such as mercury, lead, arsenic, cadmium, aluminum and other toxic metals. Although many natural health products and vitamins are promoted for this purpose, chelation therapy is the only clinically proven method of removing these metals from the body.

Chronic Mercury Toxicity (CMT) is a controversial subject, but most research studies have found that 70-90% of patients who have their amalgam fillings removed and undergo chelation therapy to eliminate the mercury from their tissues experience major improvements in a wide range of neurologic, psychiatric and immune-related symptoms. Mercury has also been linked in several studies to Parkinson's, ALS, Alzheimer's, autism and other neurologic problems.

Lead is an established cause of high blood pressure and is known to increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. One third of Ontario homes have drinking water containing elevated levels of lead. Aluminum is strongly linked to Alzheimer's disease in many population studies, and animal studies have shown that the metal mimics the brain damage seen in this disease.

We believe toxic metal overload is one of the most under-recognized causes of chronic health problems. These toxins pollute our water, our food, our air and many of us are filled with them. The diagnosis we make is not based on simple tests of hair, urine or stool - these can be very inaccurate and are not recommended. We measure total body burden by collecting urine after a standardized intravenous infusion of EDTA, DMPS and glycine. We use the most advanced protocols to eliminate unwanted side-effects.

Oxidative Therapy

This involves intravenous administration of tiny doses of hydrogen peroxide to treat chronic infections and heal the immune system. Hydrogen peroxide is a free radical that is naturally produced in peroxisomes in every cell of the body. Its first use to treat influenza was described in the medical journal The Lancet over one hundred years ago. Many animal studies have shown that it stimulates changes in interleukins and cytokines.

Hydrogen peroxide treatment has been very useful for our patients with chronic fatigue syndrom and fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, systemic lupus erythematosis (SLE), Crohn's and ulcerative colitis, scleroderma, ankylosing spondylitis and many other immune-related problems. This is a very safe therapy, with absolutely no risk of serious complications. We do not recommend oral use of hydrogen peroxide which is described in many websites.

Vitamin C for cancer

The use of intravenous vitamin C (IVC) to treat cancer was pioneered by a Scottish surgeon who worked with Linus Pauling in the 1970s. In their series of terminally ill cancer patients, those who received IVC infusions lived over 4x longer than predicted for their diagnosis. Subsequent research has demonstrated that IVC leads to production of hydrogen peroxide inside cells. This stimulates healing responses in normal cells - but it kills cancer cells.

Clinical trials of IVC in ovarian cancer and other cancers are underway at medical centres in Canada and the US. We have treated many patients with IVC, and while it is difficult to measure the statistical improvement without a controlled study, most patients remain stable or progress more slowly than they would have otherwise. We are also very encouraged by a few complete remissions we have seen. Most patients also find that they feel much better when undergoing IVC treatment, with major improvements in quality of life.

IVC has been called natural chemotherapy, but we recommend that you use it with standard treatment - not instead of it. If you have cancer, IVC can be safely combined with chemotherapy and other treatments with increased effectiveness in most cases.

Chronic Fatigue IV treatment

Chronic fatigue syndrome can be treated with a specific set of protocols. In some cases, this involves infusions of adrenal cortical extract with B vitamins and trace minerals. In other cases, high doses of vitamin C are combined with these vitamin infusions. In other cases, we administer a specific protocol developed in the US which includes over a dozen other ingredients, including taurine, NADH and other cofactors for normal energy production.

Glutathione

Glutathione is one of the most important detoxification molecules your body makes. There is a huge industry of natural health products that claim to boost glutathione levels, but it is not orally absorbed and we do not recommend them. Intravenous administration of glutathione has been used in a few specific protocols.

The first is used to treat Parkinson's disease. The protocol was developed by a US neurologist named David Perlmutter, based on the fact that oxidative stress is the primary mechanism for the disease. We have seen major improvements in patients using glutathione and highly recommend it as part of a treatment plan for this disease.

Another is for treatment of autism. These children are known to suffer from intestinal and other problems that lead to toxic overload, and most of them are deficient in glutathione. This is partly because of genetic polymorphisms in glutathione-S-transferase enzymes, which we can test for, but also due to probable infections or other stresses in utero. Most kids do very well after receiving glutathione infusions, but it is just one of many treatments that will benefit them.

Glutathione is also used in some cases of mercury toxicity and fibromyalgia. This is based on the fact that two glutathione molecules bind to each mercury atom, which leads to very rapid depletion of this essential detoxifier.

In summary, these are some of the most commonly used intravenous protocols used in a standard way by physicians around the world. Other approaches we have developed have been used to treat individuals on a case-by-case basis.