So often people are taking herbal remedies for menopause, for fertility or for erectile dysfunction and don’t know exactly what is in them. In this month’s Australian Family Physician journal there is a cautionary tale. A patient seeking fertility had been prescribed multiple herbal preparations by an Ayurvedic herbal practitioner. She presented with shortness of breath, palpitations and joint pains. She was found to have a serious anaemia and an analysis of the herbal preparations revealed high levels of lead, mercury, arsenic and chromium. She required chelation therapy to “mop up” the heavy metal levels in her body and the […]
