Hair Shaft & Growth |
Trace mineral analysis is a test which measures the mineral content of
your hair. Mineral content of the hair reflects the mineral content of
the body's tissues. If a mineral deficiency or excess exists in the hair,
it usually indicates a mineral deficiency or excess within the body, or
biounavailability. Examples: If your hair reveals an elevated calcium
level two or three times normal, then your calcium level within the body
may be elevated also. If this is the case, a strong tendency exists for
arteriosclerosis (hardening of the arteries due to calcium plaques). If
your calcium level is low, then a tendency exists toward osteoporosis
(demineralization of bone), increased tendency to bone fractures, dental
caries, periodontal disease, muscle cramps, etc. Various mineral
imbalances, as revealed by hair analysis frequently lead to metabolic
dysfunctions before any symptoms become manifest.
The vast majority of chemical reactions that govern cellular processes
are in turn regulated by enzymatic reactions. Enzyme catalysts most often
require mineral cofactors to operate. Magnesium and zinc, for instance,
are cofactors in hundreds of enzymatic reactions. Toxic elements, on the
other hand, can interfere with enzymatic reactions and disrupt cellular
activities. Thus, element insufficiencies or excesses have a significant
impact on health.
Unfortunately, nutrient element deficiencies are pandemic in our society.
Numerous government surveys have reported multiple mineral deficiencies
in a high percentage of participants. For example, studies show that more
than one-third of Americans consume less than 100% of the RDA for
calcium.1 With the enormous amounts of toxic compounds used in industry,
noxious elements are also a widespread, if less recognized, threat to
health.
To understand how hair retains elements, it is important to know the
structure of hair and how hair protein is synthesized and traps minerals.
The hair shaft is a filament formed from the matrix of cells at the
bottom of the hair follicle deep in the epidermal epithelium. Each
follicle is a miniature organ that contains both muscular and glandular
components. Human hair is 80 percent protein, 15 percent water and small
amounts of lipids and inorganic materials. The mineral content of the
hair is 0.25 percent to 0.95 percent on a dry ash basis.7 Of the
approximately 100,000 hairs in the average human scalp, 10 percent are in
the resting phase. During the growth phase, the scalp follicles produce
hair at a rate of 0.2 to 0.5 mm/day-or about 1 cm each month.
The growing hair follicle is richly supplied with blood vessels, and the
blood that bathes the follicle is the transport medium for both essential
and potentially toxic elements. As these elements reach hair follicles,
they are then incorporated into the growing hair protein. Unlike other
body tissues, hair is a metabolic end-product that incorporates elements
into its structure while growing. As hair approaches the skin surface, it
undergoes a hardening process, or keratinization, and the elements
accumulated during its formation are sealed into the protein structure of
the hair. Because of the exposure of hair follicles to the blood supply
during growth, element concentrations of the hair reflect concentrations
in other body tissues.
Arsenic: Fatigue, headaches, dermatitis, increased salivation,
muscular weakness, loss of hair and nails, hypopigmentation of skin,
anemia, skin rashes
Cadmium Loss of sense of smell, anemia, dried scaly skin, hair
loss, hypertension, kidney problems
Lead:
In children: delayed mental development, hyperactivity, delayed
learning, behavioral problems
Children and adults:
fatigue, anemia, metallic taste, loss of
appetite, weight loss and headaches, insomnia, nervousness, decreased
nerve conduction, possibly motor neuron disorders
Mercury:
Reduced sensory abilities (taste, touch, vision and hearing),
metallic taste with increased salivation, fatigue, anorexia, irritability
and excitability, psychoses, mania, anemia, paresthesias, tremors,
incoordination, cardiovascular disease, hypertension with renal
dysfunction
- Improper nutritional intake - excessive ingestion of refined carbohydrates and
sugars, a strict vegetarian diet, or other exclusive diets.
- Taking vitamins and minerals that are incomplete with your current body
chemistry.
- Medications
- Birth control pills
- Stress
- Accumulation of toxic metals from the environment, job or hobby.
- Inheritance of mineral patterns from parents.
Other conditions that can result or be aggravated by a mineral imbalance are:
- Depression * Headaches * Hair Loss
- Hypoglycemia * Hypertension * Anemia
- Hyperactivity * Arthritis * Thyroid Disturbance
- Prostate Disorders * Allergies * Digestive Disturbances
- Skin Problems * Emotional Problems
- Cardiovascular Disease * Glandular disorders
- Musculo-Skeletal Disorders
Hair analysis is an invaluable screening tool which can help develop a correct
program, without guesswork, for your nutritional and supplementation needs,
designed for each individuals specific body chemistry.
1. Your Body’s Cells
The main site of your nutritional metabolism is at the cellular level. What you
eat is not as important as what is reaching your body at the cellular level. A
tissue mineral analysis provides an inexpensive screening of information that
directly relates to your cellular activity.
2. Trends
Trends in your body’s health care toward a disease or disorder can be identified
before they occur and to be able to take action before they surface. Twenty or
more trends can be identified from a properly interpreted tissue mineral
analysis. This can make a tissue mineral analysis an invaluable screening tool.
3. Rebuilding Your Body’s Energy Mechanism
Are you feeling tired all the time? Having an adequate energy level is necessary
for your health. ALL body activities including healing depend on adequate energy
synthesis. The tissue mineral analysis can assess the efficiency of the body’s
energy systems. Two systems, the Glycolysis (A ten-step cycle involved in the
breakdown of glucose into simpler compounds, mainly pyruvate or lactate. There
are various minerals and vitamins required in the glyxolysis cycle. If there is
a deficiency, the cycle may fail to go to completion and your energy output may
decrease) and the Krebs or citric acid cycle, an intra-cellular cycle in which
amino acids and fats are converted to energy. Eighty percent of ones energy is
produced in the Krebs cycle) and to recommend nutrients and foods that are
appropriate to assist in rebuilding the energy system.
4. Determining an Individuals Oxidation Type
Dr. George Watson discovered that in some people food will burn at a faster rate
than normal and in others, at a slower rate than normal. When you know your
oxidation rate, you can decide what foods are most needed, and which nutrients
are necessary to restore balance to the body. When you take the wrong vitamin or
mineral at an excessive or deficient percent, it can make your health problems
worse. A tissue mineral analysis can be used to determine, with scientific and
mathematical precision, your individual oxidation rate. Your metabolic
blueprint. Once this is corrected, and balance is restored, the disease trend
can be slowed or possibly reversed.
5. Detecting Toxic Metals
In today’s toxic world, where we are subjected to an unclean environment, toxic
metals have become a serious problem, contributing to many metabolic disorders
and symptoms.
Such as unmanageable stress, chronic fatigue, asthma, infections, high blood
pressure, heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. While routine blood tests cannot
detect chronic heavy metal poisoning, tissue mineral analysis is one of the few
methods approved by the Environmental Protection Agency for detecting toxic
metals within the body.
6. Emotions
Biochemical imbalances can contribute to many mental and emotional disturbances.
A tissue mineral analysis can predict, explain, and suggest nutritional
solutions for common complaints such as anxiety, depression, hyperactivity,
learning disabilities, phobias, insomnia and possibly criminal behavior, etc.
7. Constructing A Picture of One’s Body Chemistry
With correct interpretation of a hair tissue mineral analysis, one can construct
a metabolic picture, your personal metabolic blueprint, of the way your body is
functioning and the way it is responding to stress. There is no other simple
test that can give you a scientific and mathematical picture of your metabolism.
8. Hair Tissue Mineral Test vs. Blood Test
A blood test is a valuable tool to determine immediately any changes occurring
in the body when the blood is drawn. It can determine your cholesterol,
hemoglobin levels, and many other parameters while in an acute stage of stress.
A blood test fluctuates daily due to the foods we eat and our emotional
stability. Mineral level in blood are ten times less than they are in soft
tissues. Blood tests also have narrower parameters or limits by the body, so
that readings vary little and very little information can be determined.
Hair analysis will not vary day to day, and will provide a long standing
metabolic blueprint of our bodies biochemical status.
9. Gland, Organ and Tissue Function
The level and ratio of the tissue minerals in the body relate to the activity of
specific glands and organs. By calculating these ratios through the mineral
test, the function of the glands and organs can be assessed long before any
abnormalities appear on x-rays and in a blood test.
10. Why Use Exact Amount of Supplements, Minerals, and Proportions of Foods?
In
today’s fad diet world, it is all about shocking the body into extremes. Yes,
you may lose the weight but at what cost to your bio-chemical stability. The
body functions best between specific ratios and levels of minerals. If one
mineral is off then eventually the others will follow. Sometimes it happens fast
and other times it is an accumulation of years. There are many factors that
contribute to the rate of decline within the body which have already been
discussed.
11. Monitoring Your Progress
In nutritional therapy, a common problem is monitoring if it is really working
for you.
Are you getting results? You may see the inches coming off and some of the
symptoms disappearing, some even persisting. But it is in the monitoring of your
biochemistry on a regular basis, that tells the true story of how your body is
functioning on the inside. How your body is transforming the internal stress
tells how you are handling the external stress of everyday life. If is
recommended that once you are on a program for three months, you do a repeat
mineral analysis. A comparison is done on the earlier tests and your program is
reevaluated scientifically instead of guessing what should be done next. What is
so great about this is you are part of the process and outcome of your
nutritional program. It is solely up to you to stay committed and involved in
every step of your road to a balanced-body chemistry.
Once I found this program, I decided I couldn’t guess anymore about what my body
needed to thrive on and remain healthy. A good analogy to this is to think of
your self as a tree. You are organic and like a tree, and if not given the
correct nutrients in the correct ratios, it will eventually wither and die,
failing to bloom or produce fruit. What is so different with the human body?
Think of this, if you can’t get pregnant, then maybe something is out of
balance, chemically, stopping you from creating a baby. It is something to think
about.
12. Accuracy and Reliability
Hair tissue mineral analysis is a highly controversial test. It has been
criticized for its accuracy. Procedures exist to make it as accurate as
possible. But no test is 100% accurate. Tissue mineral analysis by atomic
absorption is not new. It has been around for over thirty years and is used by
industrial and university chemistry labs throughout the United States. New
computer-controlled instruments make for excellent reliability.
There are many labs in this country doing Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis. You only
have to make sure that their testing procedures and preparation of the hair is
reliable.
13. What Can I Expect From A Tissue Mineral Report?
Your practitioner, whether a
chiropractor, Naturopathic Doctor, or another, will receive a booklet, 13-20
pages, containing a written report on what your tests represent, graphic
printouts of your nutrient mineral ratios, nutrient mineral levels, toxic metals
and trace minerals. Before the test is preformed, you are asked to fill out a
symptom form and add to it anything you feel is bothering you. The booklet will
contain further information about your symtomology, interpretation of your
tests, how to read the booklet, a suggested nutritional program to follow, and a
listing of specific supplements and minerals recommended and designed for you to
take to reverse your body’s metabolism.
14. How Much Hair is Necessary For The Test?
A sample of two tablespoons or 1 gram is needed for the test. A sample is taken
from the nape of your neck and as close to the hair shaft as possible. The first
one inch is used for the test as it is still alive and the newest growth.
Several small samples are taken randomly at the back of the head. For a person
with short hair, we use thinning shears to cut the hair and to stay with the
hair style. If a person has no hair on his/her head, chest hair or pubic hair
can be used. The hair samples are labeled where they have come from and the
samples are not mixed. |
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