"The Doctors" Got It Right

I just watched the episode of "The Doctors" which featured a segment on toxic black mold. The show featured an entire family that seemed to be sick all the time. "The Doctors" ordered up a home inspection to look for hidden dangers in the family's home that might be affecting their health. I thought that was a brilliant move. Typically doctors don't think in those terms. This was very out of the box thinking and they have to be commended!

Among the things the home inspector looked for were radon, toxic chemicals in the water, and mold. It turned out the occupants of this house were being subjected to over 200 times the amount of toxic mold spores that was considered dangerous. Actually, some people (those with a certain genotype) can get sick even when there are low levels of toxic mold spores. But, in the case of the family on this show....no wonder they were getting sick. 200 times what already was considered dangerous levels of black mold toxins. Wow!

What most people don't know is that 30% of all structures (home and office) have some type of mold. The leading medical doctor who has treated thousands of mold cases has found that 25% of all people are very susceptible to even moderate mold toxin exposure. So, if 30% of structures have mold and 1/4 of the people in those structures are highly likely to have ill effects from exposure that means approximately 8% of all people may have some underlying illness issues related to mold toxin exposure. That's a lot of people.

And what was most impactful about the segment on "The Doctors" was that the family being exposed to the mold explained that they went to many doctors and experts to seek help. However, nobody seemed to know what was causing their terrible and recurring sickness. It was almost a medical mystery to all the health professionals they sought out. Unfortunately, this is the signature of mold toxin illness----lots of symptoms that affect the entire body and often unexplainable by conventional medical diagnostics. It’s no wonder that most people who suffer from mold toxin illness think they're going crazy because no one can verify that they have a basis for their illness. Most of them are at their wits end.

Luckily, we have discovered ways to uncover whether a person is possibly suffering from this horrible sickness. More to come on that later............

Toxic Mold on TV and the Big Screen!

The TV show "The Doctors" will be featuring a segment today on the dangers of mold toxins in the home. The segment is called 'Home Health Risks You Never Knew About'. Watch the trailer.

And coming to a theater near you will be the documentary "Black Mold Exposure". It will be opening in select cities starting April 21st. Watch the trailer for this film below:

And I thought I knew a lot about mold (Part 2).....

Mold is the New Black (pic courtesy of ahna)

Interestingly enough, as I'd mentioned previously it appeared there were few doctors who knew how to treat mold toxin illness. In my research and speaking to people it appeared that most of the doctors treated the patient for mold. What I've learned is that the mold is not the main culprit but the toxins it produces are what's mainly responsible for the slew of problems experienced by people who've been exposed to mold. Most doctors only treat the mold itself or treat the patient for allergy type of reactions to mold. However, according to many years of research by leading mold toxin specialist, Dr. Shoemaker its the toxin that's making people really sick.

I gained insight into the idea that few doctors knew what they were dealing with when toxic mold patients came knocking on their door. A friend of mine put me in touch with the owner of a large mold inspection business. The company has been in business for about 10 years and has done thousands of inspections, yet when I finally called the owner he said "I'm so glad you called, because none of our clients have gotten any healthier by going to doctors. We haven't found one doctor all these years that's helping any of these people". I thought, 'Wow, I knew mold related sickness was not well understood, but its crazy that nobody in 10 years in this area has been able to help people."

It was very eye opening to find that the US Military had used mold toxin (mycotoxin) chemicals in biological warfare in Southeast Asia (during the "yellow rain" attacks). I was terrified to learn that our very own home or workplace could be launching its own version of biological warfare on us, the inhabitants. Very scary! Very, very scary!

It was then that I decided I'm going to put my battle gear on and aid the helpless, unknowing people who suffer from this. It reminded me of all the war movies I've seen where there were poor civilian casualties who just happened to be in the the wrong place, at the wrong time and got caught up in the crossfire. Its interesting how similar that situation is to the poor unsuspecting people who've been caught in the maelstrom of toxic mold .

And I thought I knew a lot about mold (Part 1).....

Over a year ago a colleague of mine told me about how there were many of his patients who were suffering big time from mold exposure. Dr. Andy told me how the ability to detect the underlying problem in these patients was virtually impossible. Well, at least by most conventional medical means.

Being the crazy person that I am I always like a challenge and this seemed like a challenge. Heck, patients who were very, very sick and nobody could figure out what was wrong. Plus, virtually impossible to detect. Great! Sign me up! That's what I want to do....help those people.

I gave Dr. Andy a call and he directed me in the right direction. He had me read books and articles by a physician, Ritchie Shoemaker, MD, who is the leader in figuring out how to help these people with this miserable illness. I studied for months. I read his books. I read his articles. I contacted him and leading doctors around the country that were using his methods. From my research I estimate that probably less than a couple hundred doctors exist in the country that are really well qualified to understand and tackle patients who've been exposed to mold toxins.

Knowing that very few people understand this complex illness I decided to immerse myself in this highly specific area of illness care. Based on the recommendations of the James Schaller, MD, another leading mold toxin illness expert I even got training and became a Certified Mold Inspector to better help me understand all the intricacies of the environment of people who had been exposed to mold toxins and were getting real sick.

What I realized was that there appeared to be a lot of people that were suffering from the effects of mold toxin exposure but were being diagnosed with other illnesses, such as fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, multiple chemical sensitivities, and many more.

Through trial and error and many communications back and forth with prominent mold toxin illness doctors from around the country we've developed protocols that are helping people with the ill effects from toxic mold exposure. Its really astounded me that so few doctors are effectively determining patients have this as an underlying issue. And its even more shocking to me how few of them know how to effectively treat patients who have this problem.

I'm so grateful to Dr. Andy for turning on the light bulb for me on this 'invisible illness' that affects a lot of people.