get lost with your weird animal "natural" remedies - tea is for drinking, not cleaning your teeth with, and Kid A uses tea tree shampoo and I'm not cleaning my teeth with that! I use Eucryl Tooth Powder, or occasionally make my own from an old Tawakalni tooth powder recipe, just like back in the old days.

I think he mentioned building PC's because fascination with complex systems is a frequently cited sign of aspergers/autism spectrum disorders? i dunno if curiosity about how the physical systems around us work is so much an indication of that as it is that you find people much more difficult to understand.

toothpaste... hmm colgate pro-health is my favorite.... when I put industrial strength bactericidal agents in my mouth i want to feel the burn that lets me know they're working! it uses a more traditional fluoride in higher concentration and I'm all about active ingredients - if it weren't for fluoride in toothpaste i would just brush my teeth with ivory soap because it's the same difference. also, i would point you to this page Nutrition and Physical Degeneration - would you believe that prior to the introduction of processed food most people had excellent teeth with no dentistry? fact - bad teeth indicate bad food and bad health, and the solution is either to get more calcium less sugar and more whole grains, or pay a butcher thousands of dollars to work on repairing the damage that modern living has done to your mouth. it's up to you - but is a poptart in the morning really worth thousands of dollars of your money, the hours of time lost, and the agonizing pain when one of these jokers oh-so-scientifically determines the precise location of your cavity by jamming a needle sharp hook into the nerve ending?

(p.s. smoking is almost worse for your teeth than rinsing with milkshakes every night before bed)

and what's wrong with either of those? i have a cigarette and a milkshake before bed every night!

and, incidentally, whilst I don't have any autistic spectrum disorders, I do have terribly crippling agoraphobia. And it's not fear of open spaces as people commonly think. it's fear of crowds (or any group of people one doesn't know)

---

I do have terribly crippling agoraphobia. And it's not fear of open spaces as people commonly think. it's fear of crowds (or any group of people one doesn't know)

---

Why do I not find that suprising. Though I can relate, while I don't have a pathalogical fear of them, I hate crowds, really hate them. I usually end up in a hyper-agressive state if I'm in one for too long. Which usually leads to some rip roaring arguments between Miss Mustang and myself, whom I usually take my frustrations out on, the poor dear.

I don't like crowds, or people for that matter. They always stare at me when I walk past. I'm not joking, it's true! And I'm not the only who has noticed. Especially young children, they stare me me open-mouthed. It's a bit odd actually, and I can't imagine why it happens...

Probably because you're freakishly tall.............plus you look just like a rabbit.

Which one is you, Esquilax?

Have to admit the Sexy Beast rabbit/devil/man scared the hell out of me.

As I have indicated previously CV, I most closely resemble Harvey due to my penchant for shadows (see the "Hey Eskie..." thread (Page 84) for more information on this) .

Musty - That would explain it...

hence why in Tawakalnistan everyone wears towels or burquahs, so that everyone looks the same and no-one stands out, therefore no-one gets stared at and made to feel uncomfortable. ergo, everyone is treated equally with no prejudice for or against personal appearance. A much better system in every way!

Mrs Taw reckons that I'm not just agoraphobic, that I have "Avoidant Personality Disorder" as well, or so she told me this morning. I don't even know what it is (and don't want to find out - but maybe that's a symptom?) Of course, i could just simply be a miserable old anti-social git which I really don't have a problem with! Could do without the agoraphobia though.

Edited by - Tawakalna on 11/10/2007 2:02:29 PM

back on topic now; I've investigated the so called quackery of EDTA 'chelation' and I'm not satisfied that the medical community at large has given it anything but a passing, and contemptuous glance. fact is, they make more money *now* treating symptoms with palliatives than spending decades doing controlled research on preventing or treating the underlying causes. also, they do not seem to be anywhere near as risk-averse when it comes to chopping someone open and playing bypass-the-stenosis (erhm, might it be a good idea to -close- that artery too, since a 70% stenosis is associated with fatal clots?) at 50k per pop, as opposed to dope-the-blood with a medically proven safe not to mention inexpensive therapy that, which, while it may or may not be effective in this or that disorder, has already been proven to have a positive effect on heavy metal accumulations (what could be wrong with, 'getting the lead out'? *groan* ) - with very few reports of complications (which you would think the AMA, or CDC, or whoever, would try to track through their hospitalization statistics)

all in all i think we really need to re-assess medicine in our western hemisphere: we either take care of ourselves using the best empirical evidence we have on nutrition, lifestyle, and the root of diseases so as to make primitive operations like angioplasty obsolete - OR we continue to kill ourselves with our bad habits, and go to the doctor like our mechanic, when we hear strange knocks, feel vibrations, etc etcs - keep in mind your body, unlike a car, has no users manual except one written by a million mechanics who cannot agree on what a sparkplug looks like, has no replacement parts waiting for use in some warehouse, no dealership to complain to, and that your doctor only knows as much as he bothered to learn about it by way of other 'mechanics' mistakes.

I went to see Sicko this week, the new film by Michael Moore. It's a commonplace around the world that health care in America is only for those who can pay for it, and that if you don't have health insurance, you'd better be very careful, or move to another country with a more egalitarian public health policy.

However, one-sided as he invariably is, his contrast with our National Health service was more than a tad disingenuous - it's not a utopia by any means, we have a lot of complaints about it, and it is under creeping threat and has been for quite a few years now; corrupt and bankrupt regional "Trusts" riddled with bureaucracy and waste - which I've sen for myself - overworked junior doctors, arrogant and lazy consultants milking the system, a glut of hospital acquired infections such as MRSA and C.Dificil, our local hospitals being amongst the worst in the country for this. Overburdened with managers whose main purpose is to cut costs, invariably in patient care while they splurge money on new headquarters and plush offices, and outsourcing of ancillary services and some critical services such as ambulances to incompetent contractors who often can't even meet the minimum required standards, and the denial of essential medicines to patients because the local NHS Trust won't pay for them, while a few miles away, in neighbouring Trusts, the medicines are paid for - making health care a postcode "lottery" to use a popular phrase. I can't speak for France or Canadia, the other countries Moore looked at, because I've never used their doctors or hospitals, but his Cuba comparison was for a political point - but then again, Cuba does have a superb medical system with more doctors per head of population almost any other country in the world, I believe (I knew that before I saw the film) even if you can't say much else good about it.

However, even with our NHS in the shocking state that it is these days, I'd rather have that than the American system. I wouldn't get health insurance if i lived in the States, because of my heart murmur and scarred mitral valve, the meningitis that i had 20 years ago, and the testicular cancer that i had a couple of years ago - I'd either have to stump up myself, or rely on charity (or go to Canadia) I didn't realise that the insurance companies were ripping off the people who did have insurance though, but it doesn't surprise me, nor that they keep getting away with it.

To tie in with CV's observation, one thing that most countries with national health systems do that the US privatised health system doesn't do, is place emphasis upon preventative care - in other words, get the patient to take better care of themselves, reducing the burden on the state in the future and to not treat going to the doctor like going to a mechanic. We've experienced this ourselves during the process of having the kid statemented (ie diagnosed with an autistic disorder) which in itself would have cost us a small fortune if we'd had to pay, but in the long term such a diagnosis helps everyone; him, us, and the state, because now steps can be taken to minimise the impact that this disorder will have on his life in the future and mean that he can (probably) become a contributing member of society, and not a recluse sat at home (and he'll pay taxes, so over time the state will get the money back many times over)

I can assure you that if we'd lived in America, things would have been very different. I'd probably be dead, or very very ill and unable to work, which means we'd almost certainly have lost our home, and the kid would have been written off. Mrs Taw also would probs be dead or very very ill and unable to work, as she was very ill a few years ago and has a gamut of health problems, but because she's a diabetic, she wouldn't have got health insurance and even if she did, they'd probably have turned any treatment down on the basis of "pre-existing condition" - it's one of the reasons that we find America a lovely place to visit but we would never want to live there (the other reason is guns) No-one should have to worry about whether they can afford to be ill or not, or whether their insurance that they've paid into for years is worth the paper it's written on or not. I'll stick with the British NHS ta very much, much as Nye Bevan would be turning in his grave if he knew what his successors were doing with it.

edit - in retrospect I was being rather disingenuous myself. My cancer wasn't sorted by the NHS, but by a private operation kindly paid for by my mother-in-law (because we couldn't afford it.) This was because NHS cancer treatment is predicated upon non-invasive, non-surgical methods i.e. drug treatment, otherwise known as chemotherapy. I wasn't happy about this, as general opinion was that my particular form of cancer, being physically isolated and easily accessible, was best treated surgically - but that's not NHS policy. Plus I'd seen my dad, my mum, my brother, and my best friend all die form cancer after long and difficult, and ultimately unsuccessful chemo programmes. Much as this might seem to undermine my argument for state-funded healthcare, it actually doesn't; I'd have been in the same position without the NHS,a nd actually worse off because I wouldn't have had NHS chemo to fall back on. As it was I had a relatively quick private series of ops, and then a short intense NHS chemo programme which did the necessary.

Edited by - Tawakalna on 11/12/2007 11:20:33 AM

well i'm glad for you and the family that it worked out ok - you're not the first or last cancer survivor I'll know of course (yay industrialization!) the important thing is that the system does work for most and of course the ideal is progressive medicine to prevent but that's the ideal - in reality diagnosis is being woefully underemphasized for reasons of cost efficiency so intervention is often unnecessarily late and drastic(costs are greater but only if you live this long...so i suppose the industry has done the math). for doctors here it seems that if you're 50+ years old, a smoker, and eat a diet high in saturated and trans fat...your blood pressure is a little high so they give you some meds to control that and send you on your way, never thinking to be so bold as to suggest an expensive angiogram that could detect rapidly advancing heart disease, or even a relatively inexpensive echocardiogram, or a dirt cheap nuclear tread mill stress test that could indicate a need for more testing

i think everyone can agree that administration is bloated wherever you look - too much middle management is worse than too little i think.

on mental health care i shouldn't even bother to comment on the US's because it's mostly deplorable, particularly the cost to parents who don't wish to leave their children to state care which in most states consists of warehousing them under sedative medication until they are deemed fit for walking, then kicking them onto the street where they inevitably get in further trouble, relapse, return to the institution and the cycle repeats. this is not the case in every state, most notably in Maine where the system is geared toward rehabilitation, but in most states it is

Wow! This thread suddenly has alot of posts.

Disodium EDTA chelation is not that common anymore as far as I know as it is more known that it doesn't chelate mercury - apparently the heavy metal that many see as the cause of autism. Oral chelation with DMSA has replaced it. There will probably be fewer death accidents by chelation now because it wont be that easy to mix up the chelation agent with sodium EDTA anymore.

On the internet you will probably hear tons of stories from parents who have tried a form of chelation with creams and claimed that it caused their child to improve dramatically - an interesting detail is that chelation agents are water-soluble and can't go through skin. So the creams don't really chelate.