Transcript: Radio Interview — Dr. Ed Kondrot, MD (H), CCH, & Dr. Bruce Shelton, MD, MD (H), DIHOM & USA Medical Director

11/18/02, Courtesy KNFX Radio 1100 AM, Phoenix, AZ
(Explore Issue: Volume 12, Number 2)

Dr. Kondrot: “What is Chelation, and how can it help the vascular system of the body?”

Dr. Shelton: “Well, it’s very interesting. First of all, the word itself, CHELATION, is spelled c-h-e-l-a-t-i-o-n. The word “Chele” is Latin for ‘the claw of a crab.’ That’s where it comes from. And when you ‘chelate’ something, you literally are eating a molecule of heavy metal, inside the claw of a crab, so to speak, from a chemical sense. The problem we have is that a lot of our patients are heavy metal-toxic. And heavy metal toxicity has ramifications as to the vasculature system, and to our arteries. And when you get poisoned, with say, either lead or mercury, or arsenic or aluminum, these metals get into the body, and cannot get out. Then along comes a chelating agent, which is essentially EDTA, ethylene Diamine tetra-acetic acid, which is a water-soluble molecule that has the ability to wrap itself around a heavy metal molecule, and because it’s water-soluble, and the heavy metal isn’t, it can pass out through the kidneys, where the metal molecule can’t, by itself. What I tell people is, it’s like an illegal alien, sneaking across the border, in the trunk of your car, and the customs agent doesn’t see it; or rather, the illegal alien can get through customs, when he’s in the trunk of the car and they don’t open the trunk; he gets through. The same thing is true with heavy metals, and getting heavy metals out of the body has amazing health benefits. And that’s what chelation therapy is.”

Dr. Kondrot: “And Dr. Shelton, what is the connection, then, with heavy metals and arterioschlerosis – is the arterioschlerotic plaque opposed to some of these heavy metals?”

Dr. Shelton: “No, What seems to happen is that heavy metals cause inflammatory reactions inside the blood vessels, And it’s said that when you have increased levels of heavy metals, that your nitric oxide levels decrease. Nitric Oxide is the chemical that they discovered a couple years ago that is called endothelial relaxing factor, and they rapidly went out and discovered Viagra as a result of it. When you have lowered levels of Nitric Oxide, blood doesn’t flow smoothly past those blood vessel walls, and you end up getting infections, with germs, such as herpes, or cytomegolo virus, and you could get blood clotting, and you could get a ‘sludging’ of the blood as it goes through there. By getting the heavy metals out of the artery walls, the arteries themselves produce more Nitric Oxide, and then blood flow is increased. This, of course, is good, for all parts of the body, including the heart, the eyes, the kidneys, and any places where small blood vessels have an important role in the delivery of blood.”

Dr. Kondrot: “And, of course, my main interest is in the eye, and in particular, macular degeneration. I’ve seen a lot of people with macular degeneration benefit from chelation therapy, as I’m sure you have in your practice.”

Dr. Shelton: “Well, I know you do. As a matter of fact, I basically am treating people who have cardiovascular complaints, but many of them say they can see better afterwards. And it’s because blood vessels are all over the body, and anyplace and any organ of the body that has fine blood vessels are going to benefit when you do Chelation.”