Anyone ever research volcanic ash for a possible way of helping with memory loss?

“Supposedly” metal toxification is one of the causes for dementia. I have never heard of volcanic ash being used as a detoxification for metal toxicity.
I was exposed to a large amount of mercury several years ago. I ended up having 6 times the maximum allowed mercury in my system due to exposure mercury dust. Two days after the exposure I lost my short term memory. I couldn’t remember much after reading it. It was a very scary experience for me.
I ended up doing some IV chelation therapy, and eating lots of foods that are helpful for removing mercury from my system. Foods such as cilantro, chlorella, etc.
I still have 1.5 times the maximum allowed in my system but I did get my short term memory back. This happened when I was 48 years old. I am praying that this does not cause permanent damage and that I do not come up with dementia symptoms at an early age. It’s a scary thought.
My understanding is that dementia tangles begin many many years before the symptoms begin to show. Meaning that when someone 80 years old starts showing symptoms the damage could have started when they were in their 60s.
Can that be reversed after those disconnections have already occurred. I don’t know.
I have read that chelation therapy and eating certain foods can help to prevent metals from embedding themselves in the mitochondria of your cells.
I continue to eat chlorella and eat plenty of greens to help keep my system clear.

For years, researchers have been studying systemic and brain heavy metal poisoning (lead, mercury, cadmium etc) for links to Alzheimer's disease. As far as I know, they can link it to brain damage, memory loss and dementia but not AD specifically.

Heavy metal toxicity is also suspect in many systemic or autoimmune conditions. In the world of natural health & healing, it is the reason that many nutritional doctors and practitioners have been recommending for over 40 years to get the "silver" fillings (mercury based amalgam - NOT silver, just silver colored) replaced by gold or porcelain.

There are several methods for heavy metal detoxification. One is medically intravenous chelating (pronounced KEY-lay-ting) infusions (this is NOT the same as chelatED minerals), and is the way to go when heavy metal toxicity or poisoning is identified as an immediate threat to your health because the detoxification is medically supervised and quantitatively controlled.

Many folks who seem otherwise healthy have subclinical amounts of heavy metal toxicity (often not discovered in blood lab work but in such things as hair strand analysis) which would not be identified as immediately life threatening. For individual home-choice cleansing, there is an array of products available through the health industry and these are also called chelating agents.

Bentonite Clay, a form of volcanic ash - I bet you thought I'd never get to your question! - has been taken internally for decades by preventative health enthusiasts to detoxify heavy metals. Diatomacious Earth has also been used in the same way. If you want to do research about this, start there.

So, there is the causal chain they're looking for. The relationship of heavy metals to memory loss to dementia to Alzheimer's to detoxification as a retardant or reversal of the brain damage that leads to AD and some other dementias.

Although there's nothing scientifically proven in the peer-reviewed DOCTOR journals, it remains a significant research path in the nutritional and physiological world. The doctor who mentioned it to you? Good for her/him! Ask more questions. You never know who's on the right or the wrong track when it comes to research.

I guess they grind the food grade finer. I don't know. I know they sell some diatomacious earth as insecticides that work by cutting the insects' feet off as they move through it. Some people have objected to it being sold as flea powder because it could be ingested. That is what made me uncomfortable with the idea of ingesting diatomacious earth. I just needed to realize that it is not all the same.

stev - just a note that IF heavy metal toxicity was a cause or contributor to your mom's AD, at her age and condition, the damage is likely already done in irreversible. It wouldn't hurt for you to research the protocol methodology for taking bentonite clay but, as with other additions to a senior diet, you have to be very careful. Healthy folks who understand what a cleansing crisis is can generally do detoxification independently. Altho you might be hard pressed to find a doctor who would oversee the medical detoxification of your mom, it would be the only way I would suggest you trying to implement a cleansing routine for her.

(you appear to be new to the site, so I should mention I am a nutritional consultant and para-medical esthetician for 40+ years, retired but not out of the research or counselor loop as yet)

stev - I realized after posting that I needed to be more specific about detoxification. It can always lead to a "cleansing crisis" which, in healthy individuals can be manageable, but can be devastating in an elder system, with much intestinal discomfort.

Please look up Jarisch-Herxheimer Reaction in Wikipedia for information on how endotoxins released during the death of organisms killed by antibiotics, antibacterials or even home detoxification products can result in a malaise. This is the reason I recommended that any detoxification undertaking you wish to introduce to your mother should be medically supervised.

Jesse - the food grade DE is also manufactured without impurities, to a much higher standard than for pool filters or insect control. Thank goodness, huh, if someone's eating it?

Pink - what incompetency! The protocols that a holistic dentist uses whenever messing with mercury fillings includes, but is not limited to, a rubber dental dam in your mouth so you cannot swallow any dust or shavings, oxygen in your nose so you can't breathe, adequate ventilation of the treatment room, and ion generator to clear the air of mercury vapor, special filtering masks for the dentists and staff. I had a dentist remark to me that mercury fillings would not be declared unsafe until 30 years after the last dentist at used one had died, so there could be no lawsuits. It is already known that mercury fillings are unsafe yet the FDA and the ADA continue to support their use. Before digital thermometers, didn't we all learn to be so careful about the mercury in oral glass thermometers? Seriously, if our dentist of years past told us they were putting "mercury" feelings rather than "silver" fillings, I wonder how many people would have just going along with that.

Look up "Natural Cellular Defense"
What your looking for is called: "ZEOLITE"
this is a real product that pulls poisons out of our bodies naturally;
made from volcanoes (ash) that mixes with the ocean salts and is made into Zeolites...good luck

What your looking for is called Zeolite...made from volcanic ash...google Natural Cellular Defense by Waiora....read up on this...powerful stuff!

I tried the zeolite for a year when I was exposed to mercury and it didn't help to lower my levels. I had heard many good things about it releasing heavy metals from the body. NCD is a great brand.