It is harder and harder in this modern day culture to maintain good ratios of minerals due to poor diet, exposure to heavy metals, excessive exercise and cigarette smoking, and pollutants in the atmosphere. Athletes are particularly prone to mineral ratio imbalance, a long history of over exercise, high protein diet plus adrenal stress really takes it toll on the mineral, this leaves athletes underweight, fatigued, looking older than they are and generally burnt out.
Mineral ratios are important so that everyone can perform at their peak; some important mineral ratios are calcium to Phosphorus, which can be out of balance due to consumption of soft drinks, high protein diet. Sodium to Potassium which can be out of balance due to diet, kidney function and one very important ratio zinc to copper which is out of balance at epidemic proportions.
Symptoms of low zinc to copper might be:
Anorexia
Fatigue
Irregular menstrual cycle
White stretch marks
Poor healing
White spots on fingernails
Frequent viral infections
Depression & Anxiety
Low Zinc might also be present in people with reoccurring or chronic infections that won’t shift even with the strongest immune balancing herbs and supplements
With all of these mineral imbalances it makes sense to adjust diet to support each individual and to supplement small dose minerals to help guide the ratio’s to appropriate levels; but it can be hard to achieve optimal ratios without a little guidance; hair tissue mineral analysis (HTMA) is a tool to use to achieve optimal mineral ratios.
HTMA is a great tool for your practitioner to guide you onto the right health plan. It shows the levels of 35 nutrients and metal levels, and also shows the levels of 7 toxic metals, which are commonly found to be high.
The following are symptoms of lead and mercury toxicity, which can be identified on the HTMA:
Lead
Joint pain
Neuropathy
Anemia
Insomnia
Tremors
Mercury
Headaches
Neurological symptoms
Shedding of the skin
Pink cheeks and fingers
Depression
Once the toxicity is identified by the HTMA, your practitioner can then use gentle safe supplementation of Zinc, Selenium, amino acids and products high in flavonoids and carotenoids to safely but effectively release the heavy metal burden from your body; this should only be done by a qualified practitioner.
Having the HTMA performed is easy, your Naturopath will cut a little bit of hair ideally from the nape of your neck (about a tablespoon) this is then sent to the laboratory for testing; once the results are back you and your practitioner can work at optimizing your health and create great mineral balance in your body.
