It is outrageous for the National Institutes of Health to sponsor a $31 million study of chelation therapy (Modern Physician, March 27) that left some commenters questioning the integrity of the investigators. It makes me question if NIH's entire purpose was to make it fail, since EDTA treatment is vastly cheaper than the expensive and often dangerous drugs being peddled by the pharmaceutical industry, which has long had undue influence with its friends in the Food and Drug Administration and NIH.
I have personally had over 60 intravenous chelations of ethylene diamine tetra-acetic acid (not for cardiac disease) and believe and can prove this drug saved my life. It is very safe if administered correctly. If there are concerns about low calcium levels, then clearly the investigators are not experienced in the administration of EDTA in a safe, efficacious manner. This is hardly surprising, since the vast majority of physicians know less about chelation than they do about flying spacecraft. From my own experience and study, there are probably less than a handful of qualified investigators in this country who understand the proper use of and protocols for EDTA.
Monique Bryher, retired, Los Angeles
