Free
E-newsletter
Subscribe to Housecall
Our weekly general interest
e-newsletter keeps you up to date
on a wide variety of health topics.
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Definition
By Mayo Clinic staffChelation therapy — long a treatment for mercury and lead poisoning — isn't a proven treatment for heart disease, and it can be dangerous when used as a heart disease treatment. Even so, some doctors and alternative medicine practitioners have used chelation therapy to treat heart disease and stroke.
The theory behind using chelation therapy for heart disease is that the medicine used in the treatment binds to the calcium that's in fatty deposits (plaques) in your arteries. Once the medicine binds to the calcium, the plaques are swept away as the medicine moves through your bloodstream.
The safety and effectiveness of chelation therapy for heart disease can't be determined, even after the results of the largest study conducted to date, the Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT), sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.
Neither the American Heart Association nor the American College of Cardiology recommends chelation therapy as a treatment for heart disease, and the Food and Drug Administration hasn't approved chelation therapy for use as a heart disease treatment.
- Fuster V, ed. et al. Hurst's The Heart. 13th ed. New York, N.Y.: The McGraw-Hill Companies; 2011. http://www.accessmedicine.com/resourceTOC.aspx?resourceID=5. Accessed Jan. 4, 2013.
- Questions and answers: The NIH trial of EDTA chelation therapy for coronary heart disease. National Institutes of Health. www.nhlbi.nih.gov/news/press-releases/supplement/questions-and-answers-the-nih-trial-of-edta-chelation-therapy-for-coronary-heart-disease.html. Accessed Jan. 3, 2013.
- Results of the trial to assess chelation therapy (TACT). American Heart Association. http://my.americanheart.org/idc/groups/ahamah-public/@wcm/@sop/@scon/documents/downloadable/ucm_446204.pdf. Accessed Jan. 3, 2013.
- Fihn SD, et al. 2012 ACCF/AHA/ACP/AATS/PCNA/SCAI/STS guideline for the diagnosis and management of patients with stable ischemic heart disease: Executive summary. Journal of the American College of Cardiology. 2012;60:2566.
Find Mayo Clinic on