Four Things People Get Wrong About HTMA

And what you need to know about them

I run more hair tissue mineral analyses (HTMA) than any other doctor I know. We get incredible results using this test. Today, I want to correct some misconceptions about HTMA that I consistently hear from patients and practitioners.

Common Objections to HTMA

People often object to our use of HTMA on the following grounds:

• Heavy metals are often low in the hair, but high in the body

• Many heavy metals are not excreted in the hair, but only in urine or feces

• Many pollutants of concern, like glyphosate or atrazine, are not picked up in HTMA

• HTMA cannot tell us about things like methylation or inflammation

The truth is that a great practitioner can do more with less. They can infer and deduce from their history, physical exam, and lab testing what is going on with their patients.

There are limitations, drawbacks, and advantages to every test. If you know how to look deep into lab testing, you can infer more than average clinicians.

All of the above are true, but we still get great results with HTMA.

Here is how and why.

The Advantages of HTMA

Here are the key benefits of hair tissue mineral analysis:

• Easy collection: The sample is simple to collect

• Stable sample: The sample doesn't spoil or go bad, so you can run it on patients all over the world

• Comprehensive data: You get information about practically all the minerals and metals

• Long-term picture: You get a view of the body's mineral system over three to four months

How HTMA Compares to Other Tests

Blood tests:

• Require an appointment

• May not reflect what is going on in organs and tissues

• Can go bad on their way to the lab

• Vary enormously from week to week

• Much more expensive per analyte

• Only reflect a few days to a few weeks of metabolic activity

Urine tests:

• May be done at home, but often require collecting urine over an entire day

• Can go bad on their way to the lab

• Vary enormously from week to week

• Much more expensive per analyte

• Only reflect a few days to a few weeks of metabolic activity

Real Patient Success

People who criticize HTMA usually know nothing about it (I am not exaggerating here) beyond that it doesn't necessarily reflect blood or tissue levels of heavy metals and minerals.

Here is Clark Engelbert's story of how HTMA helped him to recover from crippling mental illness:

Stories of Hope & Healing: Healing Through Mineral Balancing with Clark Engelbert

Patients give us compelling testimonials all the time about the power of HTMA.

Clark and I are enrolling a new cohort of our HTMA training program.

We are looking for 15 practitioners who want to deepen their knowledge of or get started with HTMA.

Here is the new link for the HTMA Secrets, starting in July. We will start Monday, July 14th, so I can have the next month to advertise. We are focusing on getting 15 aspiring or current practitioners in the program.

Here are the details:

• Cost is $1,995 (three monthly payments of $665).

• Weekly calls with Dr. Stillman - Mondays at 4pm Eastern, starting July 14th

• Weekly calls with Clark - Fridays at 4pm Eastern, starting July 18th

What you’ll learn:

• How to interview clients/patients for maximum success on mineral balancing

• How to take a history of metal exposure and mineral intake

• How to counsel clients/patients on diet and lifestyle changes for great results

• How minerals affect immunity, metabolism, and mental health

• How to create personalized supplement regimens for clients/patients to maximize detoxification and optimize metabolism

Clark and I are teaching what we’ve learned that has helped us to build successful word-of-mouth practices. We are looking forward to teaching 15 people how to do the same this summer!

You can enroll here.

Want more information?

Here are two more podcasts Clark and I have put together about HTMA:

Heavy Metals and Autoimmunity: Uncovering the Immune System Connection with Clark Engelbert

The Hidden Power of Minerals: How HTMA Can Transform Your Health with Clark Engelbert

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Separating Fact from Fiction

Let's address each common criticism:

1. "Heavy metals are often low in the hair, but high in the body"

This is true — and this is why having a practitioner skilled in HTMA interpretation is worth having.

Critics point out this fact as a reason not to use HTMA. On the contrary, to those of us who routinely run HTMA, this is a strength of the test rather than a weakness.

For each metal and mineral, we have something called a "poor eliminator range." This is the range at which the level is so low that we suspect, rather than lack of the mineral or metal, that the body just isn't pushing it out into the hair. When metals and minerals are extremely low, you are likely looking at a patient who is exhausted and cannot excrete metals and minerals into the hair.

As you get patients better, you should expect their hair mineral levels to rise as their symptoms improve. This is one of the signs that what you are doing is working. This is not a limitation of the test, it is in fact a feature.

2. "Many heavy metals are not excreted in the hair, but only in urine or feces"

This is also true, but this is irrelevant as to whether or not HTMA is a good test.

Why?

We don't primarily use HTMA to determine what toxic metals someone has. This may surprise you. We primarily use it to personalize someone's nutritional supplementation regimen.

Once we have them on the right regimen, their toxic metal levels will eventually rise. They may not. Either way, patients report significant improvement.

We treat patients, not numbers. The goal isn’t to provoke metals into the hair. As we have covered already, the metals can be eliminated via other routes. This matters more than what is excreted in the hair.

3. "Many pollutants of concern, like glyphosate or atrazine, are not picked up in HTMA"

This is true, but it is largely irrelevant. Blood and urine testing can easily miss these. Who is to say that these are absent from patients who have low or zero levels? The truth is that these chemicals are dynamic and may or may not be detected by blood or urine testing.

What I have found is that when the body's minerals are in balance, the body naturally excretes toxins. We often hear from patients on mineral balancing that they are:

• Passing things that look like parasites

• Having dark and cloudy urine

• Experiencing urine with an offensive odor

This is certainly not the minerals that they are taking. The only explanation I can think of is that the supplements are causing them to expel toxins that had otherwise been retained in cells and tissues.

I don't care as much about quantifying what's in the body, as I do about getting the body to eliminate toxins. The great thing about hair testing is that it is affordable, easy to perform, and provides us with enough data to tailor supplements to our patients to get them great results.

A Matter of Toxicity

Besides which, heavy metals are much, much more toxic than other toxins. For reference:

• A lethal dose of mercury can fit on one corner of your pinky fingernail

• You would have to bathe in glyphosate for it to kill you

I am not saying that glyphosate isn't dangerous, but it is orders of magnitude less toxic than mercury.

Likewise, metals are more ubiquitous than many chemicals. For example:

• Almost every packaged good in the grocery store is packaged in aluminum

• The water used to prepare processed foods and beverages like soda often contains aluminum as an additive

The point is that we don't need data on all these other toxins to get patients well. If you want to test it, go ahead, but it isn't necessary for great results in my experience.

4. "HTMA cannot tell us about things like methylation or inflammation"

If you know how to properly interpret an HTMA, you can infer what someone's methylation status is and correct for it. If a patient can get you a detailed dietary history, then you can further deduce their methylation status.

Everything we do in mineral balancing is designed to correct for underlying methylation defects and for inflammation.

While we cannot infer from HTMA testing what someone's inflammatory levels are, we see inflammatory levels in patients who are taking our mineral balancing protocols decline quickly. We typically see declines of 50-100% over six to twelve months on our program.

Learn more about our autoimmunity recovery program here, where we use HTMA in conjunction with supplements, lifestyle changes, light therapy, and prescriptions in order to help people recover from autoimmune diseases:

Dr. Stillman's Autoimmunity Recovery Framework

I host a monthly masterclass on autoimmunity - click on the post above for a link to register.

Unfortunately, many patients do not continue with mineral balancing for long enough to see the full benefit. We often see patients pause treatment for months at a time. Their inflammatory markers stop declining when they stop taking the supplement protocols we recommend to them. I try to communicate to patients that quarterly HTMA testing is the backbone of what we do in my practice.

We don't test methylation status or inflammatory levels with more than the HTMA in my practice, and we still see patients making massive improvements in their health. We can order additional testing as needed, but at this time we don’t see that the benefit outweighs the cost to our patients.

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The Bottom Line

You don't need all the testing under the sun to get great results.

I wrote more about this in these posts:

Why I pay cash for my labs

Testing I Trust in My Practice

The Truth About Lab Testing

Until next time, be well,
Dr. Stillman