Mold: A Health Disaster, Part 1

First installment:   My visit with Dr. Shoemaker

I have posted before about Dr. Ritchie Shoemaker MD, author of The Mold Warriors.  I promised that I would write more later.  This post will be the first of several (many?) to come regarding the things I have been learning about what Dr. Shoemaker calls "Biotoxin Related Illness." 

I have come to believe very strongly that he has happened upon insights into chronic illness that are truly a breakthrough.   I am predicting that he will eventually win a Nobel Prize.  I don't make this prediction lightly!  It will take between 15 and 25 years, but I think his discoveries are so important for tens of millions of people, that he will be given this award.  If he doesn't get it, then he should!

I first read his book Desperation Medicine in April 2005 at the same time I was first publishing my own book, Wellness Piece by Piece.  I was so impressed with what I read that, in May, I personally went to see Dr. Shoemaker.  His practice is in Pokemoke, Maryland.  You almost can't get there from anywhere.  Even so, people come from all over the world to Pokemoke to see him.

I greatly enjoyed meeting Ritchie, as he prefers to be called.  He spent over 2 hours with me asking many questions and carefully listening to my answers.  That is a totally different medical concept, isn't it?

He took about 15 vials of blood for all the tests he regularly does for people who have chronic illnesses.  These are tests which I had never heard of, but which I have since learned are widely available.  He has tested and treated more than 3,000 chronically ill patients and has developed a database of biomarkers based on the results of these tests.  He has more data than any other doctor on the planet regarding chronic illness.

He did a Visual Contrast Sensitivity (VCS) test that measures your ability to see different contrasts.  He learned from a PhD at the Environmental Protection Agency that people exposed to biotoxins have an impaired ability to discern contrasts that improve upon treatment.  Biotoxins affect the brain.  The retina is a microcosm of the brain.  Up to one third of the brain is used for processing sight.  About halfway into the test, Ritchie said to my wife, "I hope you realize that he is failing this test miserably."  (I don't like to fail tests!)

He measured my wingspan to determine if it was greater than my height.  Statistically, Ritchie had learned that if a person's wingspan is greater than his or her height, then that person is much more likely to be susceptible to biotoxins.  My wingspan is greater than my height.

As he listened to my medical history, he commented that my genotype was most likely HLA DR 14-5-52B.  A few weeks later, I got an email from him confirming that, in fact, this was my genotype. I was impressed! He said this genotype is highly susceptible to many biotoxins, especially mold.  This genotype represents 3.1% of the population.  It is one of several genotypes susceptible to biotoxins. He added that it also meant he and I were likely related since it was his genotype as well.  I told him I thought he looked familiar!  He actually does look like one of my uncles.  :-)

Another doctor had previously done a Western Blot Lyme test on me earlier in the year.  The test came back positive.  He wanted to install a catheter to feed antibiotics into me intravenously 3 times a day for a few months.  I refused because my intuition said that I did not have Lyme.  I wanted to learn Ritchie's perspective about my Lyme diagnosis since he had treated over 1,000 patients with Lyme and he had it five times himself.  (Maryland is one of the Lyme capitals of the world.)  After looking at all my blood tests he said I definitely did not have Lyme.  He was able to tell mainly from a couple of my immune system biomarkers called C3a and C4a.  And I did not fit the pattern of a Lyme patient at all.  That was a great relief.

A few weeks later in a follow-up conversation Ritchie told me that I had a "very deranged physiology."  However, he said that I was functioning at a much higher level than I should be.  He said I should be feeling much sicker.  He said that he needed to learn more about the nutritional, lifestyle things I had learned to do since they were obviously helping me.  I found this encouraging.  Over many years, I had learned many things that helped me. I now could possibly get even better.  I felt like I was uncovering an underlying cause that I had never suspected at all.  It would prove to be a pivotal turning point for me.

More posts about mold.

Technorati Tags: Health and Wellness, Mold, Chronic Fatigue, Fibromyalgia, Diarrhea, Headache

Comments

[Scott Forsgren]

I agree that Dr. Shoemaker's work is critically important. Having suffered for 9 years now with chronic illness just diagnosed 9 months ago with Lyme disease, I understand the struggle all too well. Now that I have worked on the Lyme aspect, I am pursuing further work with Dr. Shoemaker's program as I have the "dreaded" 4-3-53 genotype. I am hoping that pursual of the Shoemaker program will help me move to the next level of wellness.