Too embarrassed to ask your doctor about sex, body quirks, or the latest celeb health fad? In a regular feature and a new book, "What the Yuck?!," Health magazine medical editor Dr. Roshini Raj tackles your most personal and provocative questions. Q: Can you really get mercury poisoning from eating too much sushi? Believe it or not, you can. Mercury - a toxic heavy metal that can cause neurological problems - exists in high levels in such sushi staples as tuna (bluefin is one of the worst), mackerel, yellowtail, swordfish, and sea bass. (Other fish can contain a lot of mercury if they swim in polluted waters.) So if you're eating sushi, particularly these bad-news varieties of it, more than six times a week, you could be getting too much mercury, as actor Jeremy Piven claimed he was. I had a patient who came to me after surviving a heart attack. His doctor had told him to eat a high-fish diet, so he dutifully grilled tuna every day for a year. Then, he started noticing weird neurological symptoms.

We tested his mercury level and it was through the roof. So how can you detox your sushi platter? First, don't eat fish every day. If you're going to have seafood that often, at least cut back on the most mercury-filled varieties. Skip these types of fish entirely while you're pregnant and nursing, because mercury exposure can very seriously harm the development of a fetus or young child. And don't serve it to your little ones, who can be affected by much lower levels of the metal than adults would. (In fact, very young kids shouldn't eat raw fish period because of the risk of food poisoning, which can be devastating.) And if you start to experience symptoms such as tremors, vision problems, and irritability, or if you just want to know you're in the clear, ask your doctor for a blood-mercury check. If it's high, he may advise you to cut back.One evening, I was sitting at a sushi bar in Los Angeles. I’d just finished one of my favorite dishes — spicy tuna roll — when I began to feel dizzy.

I was so dizzy, I couldn’t even stand up. I had to get help out of the sushi bar and back to my hotel. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had been hit by a severe bout of mercury poisoning. Wild tuna is one of the best sources of essential omega-3 fats. But, sadly, the large wild tuna that are used to make high-end sushi are also the most likely to contain high levels of mercury. And this poisonous heavy metal can cause serious toxic reactions in your body — as I discovered in that sushi bar in LA. When I returned to Florida, I had my clinic give me a course of a treatment that I knew would cleanse my body of mercury. In a minute, I’m going to show you how you can eliminate this highly toxic heavy metal from your body, too. But first, let’s look at the dangers of mercury and where it comes from. The toxic heavy metal is spewed into our environment daily from industrial mining and power generation. It finds its way into the air we breathe and the food we eat.

High levels of mercury — often in the form of extremely toxic methylmercury — are also absorbed into the marine food chain from industrial pollution. Mercury accumulates in the fish over its life and is concentrated when they eat other, smaller fish. Long-lived and predatory species, like bluefin tuna, are especially effective mercury banks.genki sushi menu hawaii But industrial pollution isn’t the only source of mercury. sushi grade fish mountain viewThe “silver” amalgams in your teeth often contain 50% mercury. where to get sushi grade fish los angelesSo each time you chew your food, toxic mercury vapor is released in your mouth.isushi grade salmon buy

And dizziness isn’t the only danger. Mercury has been shown to damage the immune system, put unborn babies at risk and harm the central nervous system. It has also been linked to devastating conditions, like Alzheimer’s disease and autism, whose victims have been found to have elevated levels of mercury. The symptoms of mercury poisoning aren’t always apparent — because you don’t feel what mercury is doing to your body. Yet it destroys your nerve cells and invades your heart, bone, and brain. You could forget names or have trouble concentrating and paying attention. Your reflexes may be slow. Or you develop numbness and tingling. Mercury can make you feel like you’re crazy. Unfortunately, most doctors don’t know that symptoms like these may mean you have mercury poisoning. The heavy metal also leads to chronic inflammation, which causes disease, ages you faster, and shortens your life. When I came across a new clinical study from Finland recently that linked heavy metals and heart disease, I wasn’t surprised.

It supports the observations I’ve seen for years in my own clinic. Results from a study on more than 3,000 healthy Finnish men proved the connection between mercury and cardiovascular disease. The study revealed that the men who ate the largest amount of fish had the highest levels of mercury in their bodies and the highest risk of heart disease.ii And in another recent study, researchers looked at Nordic whaling men from the Faroe Islands, who live on a diet of fish. As mercury levels in the men went up, blood pressure and atherosclerosis went up. This study was one more confirmation of what I’ve known for a long time: Mercury can give you cardiovascular disease.iii Although mainstream medicine likes to blame cholesterol for heart disease, science has known for a long time the underlying culprit is inflammation. And the inflammatory effect of mercury on your cardiovascular system can be devastating. Most mainstream doctors believe that heavy metals are naturally removed from your body through your kidneys and liver.

But this is far from true. Heavy metals remain in your body for years. But to reverse the effect of mercury in your body, you need to detox — and that means chelation. I’ve found the most effective approach combines both oral chelation and IV chelation. The word “chelate” comes from the Greek word “chele,” which means “claw.” And that’s exactly what chelation does. The heavy metals are “clawed” out of your body — albeit painlessly. Here at the Sears Institute for Anti-Aging Medicine, I use calcium disodium EDTA for IV chelation directly into your bloodstream. In no time, heavy metals are “grabbed” by the EDTA and taken out. Extensive research on chelation also shows that it protects the heart and increases vascular flexibility by dissolving hardened calcium that causes stiff arteries and atherosclerosis. It has also been shown to restore brain function from mercury poisoning. If you’re interested in IV chelation at my clinic, please call 561-784-7852.

DMSA (Meso-2, 3-dimercaptosuccinic acid): I took DMSA after my mercury poisoning episode in LA. This compound is highly effective at eliminating mercury from your body. It can even remove mercury that has deposited in the brain. DMSA has receptor sites to which mercury binds. It lives inside cells and DMSA cannot enter the cells. Instead, glutathione (your body’s natural toxin remover) pushes the metals out of the cell, where they’re picked up by DMSA and excreted. This is also a good way to test for heavy metals, because it liberates the toxins, which can then be identified in a urine sample. It should be taken in on-again/off-again cycles — ideally, three days on and 11 days off, because your body needs 11 days to regenerate its glutathione levels. Milk thistle (Silybum marianum): This medicinal plant has been used by traditional healers for more than 2,000 years — but most modern doctors know nothing about it. It’s one of the best herbs I’ve found for clearing toxins from your blood.

It has a potent antioxidant called silymarin that helps detoxify the liver and restore healthy liver function. Milk thistle can be found at your local health food store in many forms. I recommend the capsules. Take 200 mg of an extract standardized to 80% silymarin two or three times per day. Chlorella: Chlorella is algae full of chlorophyll and you can find it in any health food store. It detoxifies the body by binding to toxins like mercury and pulling them through our system. Add 3 grams per day to your smoothie, juice or water. (Lemon can help with the unpleasant taste!) To Your Good Health, iMitchell RJ, Osborne PB, Haubenreich JE. Dental amalgam restorations: daily mercury dose and biocompatibility. J Long Term Eff Med Implants. iiVirtanen, J., Voutilainen, T., et. al., “Mercury, Fish Oils, and Risk of Acute Coronary Events and Cardiovascular Disease, Coronary Heart Disease, and All-Cause Mortality in Men in Eastern Finland” Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol. 2005;25:228-233.