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One of barriers to finding a cause or treatment for calcification is that some experts have long claimed it is part of body’s healing process. Because of this widespread idea, doctors have often not considered calcification to be at root of problem. They also often don’t associate calcification with trademark inflammation that accompanies it.
Yet up-to-date medical manuals such as authoritative Merck Manual of Diagnosis — a bible found in many doctors’ offices — describe calcium phosphate crystals that make up calcification as “aggressive” and provoking chronic inflammation as well as attacking joints.
Now, discovery of a tiny particle has shown a link between calcification and inflammation. Scientists who now work with National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) discovered something so small that it challenges definition of life. It made headlines when Mayo Clinic researchers found it in heart disease, while others discovered how to test for and treat it.
Basically, scientists found that particle generates a calcium phosphate shell while in blood, and attacks human tissue. This provokes an immune reaction that includes chronic inflammation.
And in October, Journal Pathophysiology published clinical trial results suggesting that when particle is targeted with treatment, calcification seems to be reversible. [Study title: Maniscalco et al, "Calcification in Coronary Artery Disease can be Reversed by Long-Term EDTA-tetracycline chemotherapy," Pathophysiology 11 (2004) 95–101.]
The study also demonstrated reversal of most of clinical symptoms of atherosclerosis, including coronary artery calcification, in a majority of patients who participated in trial.
The authors of study emphasize that results are just preliminary, but nonetheless treatment that they used is available now as a combination of an over-the-counter nutraceutical and a prescription of generic antibiotics.
The problem with tiny discovered particle that seems to be generating calcification is that no one knows exactly what it is. Its DNA remains a mystery because much of can’t be isolated using standard tests. So right now, scientists from NASA and a dozen or so international institutes are using nanotechnology methods to try and decipher its secrets.
Look for next installment to see what they have found, and how it affects treatment.
Douglas Mulhall, nanotechnology journalist, is co-author with biological engineer Katja Hansen of THE CALCIUM BOMB: The Nanobacteria Link to Heart Disease & Cancer (The Writers’ Collective) that explores new discoveries about calcification. Afterword by leading cardiologist Dr. Benedict Maniscalco. See www.calcify.com Mulhall also authored the acclaimed book, OUR MOLECULAR FUTURE.