The Importance of Heavy Metal Testing In Autism

Heavy metal testing is an essential component in medicine especially in autism intervention. We must understand the diagnostic tools used for heavy metal exposure as well as toxicity levels to know the necessary things to do to address a certain problem.

When it comes to autism, testing your child for heavy metal contamination can be a great thing to do. Although there is no test that will tell you of how much or the exact level of heavy metal contamination in your child’s body, you can only have the idea of their presence but their absolute total value is immeasurable. The reason of this is that metals are stored in various parts of the body such as the kidney, liver or the brain.

So why do we need to have heavy metal testing? Having the baseline information about autism spectrum is much important to verify the need for any biomedical autism intervention like a detoxification treatment. Here are some of the specimens that may be used during the testing.

Through the hair. Using the hair, it will give you the idea of a past exposure of metals. It is a cheap, easy to obtain and non-invasive way of testing. Metals can be detected in the body tissue for the past 10 to 12 weeks. Children with autism spectrum have lower levels of heavy metal contamination in the body like mercury when compared with neuro typical children. If this is the case, a child might not excrete the mercury effectively.

Through the feces. You can get information about environmental exposure through the food and water ingested by examining the stool of a child. What gets in through the mouth will get out through the rectum. However, the heavy metal levels that might be found in the stool do not essentially mean what is being detoxified from the body.

Through the blood. Most of the testing is done by collecting the blood. However, it will not rule out the possibility of mercury exposure if the test indicates negative. Blood immunology testing determines toxicity. Nevertheless, this is somewhat difficult to have because antibodies production in kids is can be low and the testing itself is not always available.

Through the urine. This is the most preferred specimen for the test. The urine is collected over a period of time to know the metal excretion into the urine. Porphyrin Urine Analysis is also done to know the cellular toxicity to heavy metals.

The specimen listed above will be used to indicate if your child has been exposed to heavy metals like mercury and other harmful elements. The tests conducted will determine what is coming out from your child’s body but will not indicate what is being left behind inside his organs. Not all heavy metal tests will give the answers, so it will be better to change the lifestyle of your child and try to avoid the possible culprits of the said toxicity.

Do not lose hope because autism can now be treated. If your child is showing symptoms of it, then do these biomedical autism treatments as well as some other therapies. Several children with autism are improving when they undergo these treatments. For more information about this, check it on Holistic Health Practitioner.