Patient Information

Patients deserve to be able, for free, to learn the tools to figure out why they may be sick in order to start the process of getting well.  Unfortuantley many people don't want to start this process until they are very ill and feel like they are dying.  At that point the cellular damage may have be severe and irreversible.  It is best to nip problems in the bud before they become 'fix named diseases' which are hard to completely reverse.

• Healthy House
  
  • Initially I think a great book to start with to teach you the basics of what materials to use when doing a new floor or getting kitchen cabinets is Prescriptions for a Healthy House by Laporte et al.
    
  • One piece of advice before moving or building is to get treated first and perhaps heal somewhere temporary for the first couple of years. Then when you seek to build or buy and fix up a home you will know how sensitive you are going to be for the future and shop accordingly.  Intitially you may be so intolerant of all living spaces that it is impossible to find a house that will work.
    
  • You can make one oasis bedroom and one living room to suit your needs and not use the rest of a house for example. Some patients even live in a tent for a while in order to avoid the higher VOC's in indoor environments.  A metal trailor or Denny foil lined room can also tide someone over as temporary living quarters if they are severely chemically sensitive. 
    
  •  Carpeting in the bedroom is the biggest mistake one can make in an effort to heal. At all costs remove it in favor of tile and non toxic grout or even cover it with denny foil and cotton painting tarps if you can't rip it out.  If you use wood try to read up on types of woods that are tolerable. Pine especially that is unsealed is the worst. Do not try to live in a post and beam house or one with pine floors.  The pine terpines are the hardest to tolerate for many of us. (Not to mention Cedar etc). 
    
  • Oak, poplar and maple are much more user friendly. I have sealed all wood in my home even the furniture with low VOC Polyurethane and I therefore can have wood now where as I could never have tolerated it 3 years ago when I left Dallas after treatment.
    
  • There are many books and tapes on building and remodeling a healthy House. John Bower and Bill Rea are authors as well.
    
  • Beware that 'green building' does not mean building safely for the sensitive inhabitant. It means kind to the environment and efficient energy usage.  What you want in a builder is someone who knows how to build for the chemically sensitive. They are few and far between.  Formaldehyde free plywood, dry wall without paper called Fiberock Aquatough are examples of materials that are commercially available to you for building. I like Devoe no VOC paint and I recommend Icynene insulation as well.

   

• Inroduction - What is a patient to do?
  

   

   

  • Above all it is very important to remember that all of the rest of us have also been where you are right now.  I know it is overwhelming to think that you have been sick for a long time and is this a possible course for you to follow?  Many people are suspicious of new treatments and gimmics- which I totally encourage.  I am not suggesting any leap into purchasing anything on the hopes that a single supplement or treatment will fix all you’re ailments – that is not realistic.
    
  • In fact, what I am advocating is reading a chapter of a book to get you going on your journey of learning about your health.  I cannot spoon feed you all you need to know.  You have to push yourself to follow some of my suggestions and believe that I must know something if I looked like I had Lou Gehrig’s symptoms and now I feel pretty strong and vigorous! 
    
  • Environmental Medicine has been around for a long time and the fact that no one knows about it is not your problem. Your problem is getting well.  As Sherry Rogers says in Tired or Toxic; do not waste your energy on educating every doctor that you see. You do not have the stamina for that and it is also harder than you think to explain this field and get them to understand it – so don’t bother.
    
  • Sherry also mentions that there is no such thing as a hypochondriac.  Only doctors who cannot figure out what is wrong with you.  So starting from the premise that your symptoms are real and you deserve to get to the bottom of them – lets get started by taking a history and proceed to the steps you should take one day at a time to put yourself back together.
    
  • In the meantime you may need a couple new physicians and may want to research who to make appointments with in environmental medicine and affiliated fields in the next couple months.  See AAEMonline.org to find a list of environmental physicians in your state. 
    
  •  You may need a local environmental doctor and may need to travel to a more experienced environmental doctor far away if you are too sick for the local doctor to handle initially.  For example, in Dallas (214 368 4132, ehcd.com) they have housing that includes tile floors, charcoal air filters, and organic mattresses.  If you are chemically sensitive and cannot stay in a carpeted hotel then this may be a consideration for you.  Their website has lots of great information about treatment for you to learn from and medical articles as well.

   

   

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