Flushing Out Lead, Metals With Chelation Therapy
April Fulton:
Sherri Oliver lives in a small town on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. It's a two-hour bus ride to get to the Mount Washington Pediatric Hospital in Baltimore -- and she has brought her daughter, Katie Dail.
Katie has dangerously high levels of lead in her blood.
She's a fast-moving first-grader with copper-colored hair. Katie has bright brown eyes but has trouble making eye contact. She also has autism -- and she doesn't really speak, but she makes a kind of whooping sound when she's happy.
But Katie is not here for autism treatment. The treatment she has been getting -- chelation therapy -- is to get her lead levels down. Although hospitals offer the treatment, some desperate parents are turning to home-based chelation kits and over-the-counter pills, which doctors say can be more dangerous.
Posted by Jim Zellmer at January 5, 2011 2:03 AM
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