RETESTING THE HAIR MINERALS

by Dr. Lawrence Wilson

© August 2019, LD Wilson Consultants, Inc.

All information in this article is for educational purposes only. It is not for the diagnosis, treatment, prescription or cure of any disease or health condition.

Retesting the balance of the minerals in the hair tissue every 3 to 6 months is a critical part of all development programs. The main reason for this is to keep the program appropriate or proper. Otherwise, one’s progress often stops and one may feel worse.

A properly designed development program will slowly uncover deeper layers of biochemical imbalances, toxic metals, chronic infections and nutrient deficiencies. This changes the hair mineral readings. A new program is often then required to rebalance the minerals.

A retest is needed to guide the changes in the diet, the lifestyle and the supplement program to keep the body chemistry balanced. This is needed to speed one’s development.

Many people believe that foods and nutritional supplements are harmless and it does not matter what one takes. This is not true. For example, for a person who has a fast oxidation rate, B-complex vitamins will often make irritability and anxiety worse!

An improper diet or supplement program could also make a person even more depressed, in some cases. If toxic metals are in the process of being eliminated, one may require different supplements to support the body, a different detoxification regimen, or lifestyle changes to support the process. These are just a few examples of why retesting is so critical for the best results with development.

OTHER REASONS FOR RETESTING THE HAIR

1. Safety. Retests are needed to make sure the healing program is actually improving one’s health. Safety is always the most important consideration in development science, and we wish it was most important in all of health care.

2. Maintaining a high vitality level. We find that when the nutrition program is set up to gently balance body chemistry, a person’s vitality increases dramatically. This is necessary for deep healing and development. Retesting regularly is the only way to assess whether the program is appropriate to maximize vitality and adaptive energy production.

3. Addressing new stress factors in a person’s life. Retests allow us to alter a development program to account for changes in a person’s life that may affect body chemistry. This is critical to assure the highest vitality level and a balanced body chemistry in the face of stressors of all kinds such as accidents, divorce, and even a new job or a move.

4. Insights about puzzling symptoms. Many symptoms such as fatigue, pain, low blood sugar or others may be due to temporary changes in body chemistry that will be revealed on a retest. If one knows what is occurring at the deepest cellular level, one can take steps to compensate or change the program, which often relieves these symptoms. Symptoms may be physical, mental and emotional.

5. Addressing latent and sub-clinical health conditions. Most people have latent health conditions. These may be chronic infections, tumors, artery disease, tissue weaknesses or other conditions that are so hidden they are not revealed on standard medical tests. However, they are important if one is to prevent health problems later in life.

Development science can and does always address these hidden conditions. Often the only evidence of their existence is a significant shift on a hair mineral retest after a person has been on a development program for several months or longer. Using the retest, it is possible to adjust the development program to assist the body to heal these sub-clinical and latent conditions.

6. Cost effectiveness. It is often a waste of money and effort to remain on a nutritional program that is not appropriate for one’s body chemistry. In fact, the wrong supplements, for example, can set one back instead of moving one forward on a healing path.

7. Reassurance, guidance and feedback for practitioners. Retests provide a lot of reassurance for practitioners and clients. If no change occurs at all on a retest, for example, perhaps the person is not following the diet, supplements and lifestyle correctly. Perhaps there is so much psychological or other stress that it is negating the benefits of the program and must be addressed.

HOW MANY RETESTS DOES A PERSON NEED?

We suggest retesting after 3-4 months after the first hair test and we require retesting every 6 months while a person is following a development program. If one does not retest every 6 months, we assume one is not following the program.

WHEN TO RETEST SOONER

In a few situations, it is best to retest after 3 months or no more than 4 months. These situations include if your previous test revealed:

Patterns that often change quickly:

- a four lows pattern.

- a four highs pattern.

- a fast oxidation rate in an adult.

- a borderline pattern, meaning just barely in or out of four lows, or a borderline oxidation rate, for example.

Patterns that need watching:

- a step up pattern

- extremely slow oxidation

- perhaps if the toxic metal levels were very high.

If needed for very careful monitoring, one can retest the hair after about 2 months. To do this properly, one cuts the hair sample very close to the scalp and then cuts off most of the hair, leaving a sample that is no more than ½ inch or 1 cm long.

HOW MANY RETESTS ARE NEEDED?

Symptoms often begin to disappear within a few weeks to months when one follows a development program. However, rebuilding digestion and releasing traumas and deeper layers of adaptations and compensations takes longer.

Also, development begins to occur within a year on a development program. Development is an amazing and lengthy process that goes on for years and years. It offers tremendous benefits, so we highly recommend that one remain on a development program for life. For details about development, read Introduction To Development.

QUESTIONS THAT ARISE ABOUT RETESTS

A person may feel better, yet a hair mineral analysis retest might reveal worsened ratios or little significant change. Conversely, a person may feel the same or worse, yet the retest shows improvement. Why does these confusing situations arise?

Compensations and adaptations. A key to these phenomena is to understand adaptation. A fundamental principle of development is that our bodies survive by compensating or adapting to stress.

Adaptations are biochemical changes in the body that occur moment to moment and day to day as we react to our environment. They reflected in altered mineral levels and ratios on a hair test. Taken together, the altered levels and ratios are called homeostatic states.

    For example, very slow oxidation is a homeostatic state characterized by the tendency for low energy, depression and low blood sugar. It is, however, the best the body can do at the time. Very fast oxidation is another homeostatic state with different symptoms. High levels of toxic metals is a third state and so forth.

With this understanding of adaptations and compensations, one can better understand why retests and symptoms do not always or even most often correlate completely.

The test or the symptoms may lead. In some cases, the symptoms may change before the retest. In other cases, the body chemistry may shift before symptomatic changes are noticeable. This is a common source of confusion with retests.

Uncovering deeper layers of imbalances. This is another key concept to avoid confusion with retests. Often a retest shows a different picture because one has discovered a deeper layer of imbalance, toxic metals or some other alterations of body chemistry.

Now let us discuss why certain unusual phenomena occur on retests.

I FEEL BETTER, BUT THE TEST IS WORSE

1. Decompensation. One reason this occurs is decompensation. After several weeks or months on a nutrition program, nutrients are replenished and energy improves. The body then does not need to compensate as much and a change of equilibrium or homeostasis occurs. Occasionally, a temporary increased imbalance occurs.

Zinc decreases. An example is a patient with a good zinc level, in spite of symptoms such as prostate enlargement, skin problems, decreased sense of taste and smell, poor digestion or other zinc deficiency symptoms. On a second or third test, the zinc level may drop precipitously, yet the patient reports feeling better. What happened?

    The zinc reading was originally displaced upwards, to balance something else or by a toxic metal such as cadmium. Cadmium and other toxic metals can cause physiological mineral levels to appear higher in the hair.

As energy increases, cadmium is eliminated from the body. As cadmium is released, zinc replaces it in the tissues and for a while less zinc is excreted into the hair tissue. The retention of the zinc, along with cadmium elimination, causes improvement in symptoms.

An oxidation rate worsens. A second example is a chronically ill (compensated) patient with a fairly balanced oxidation rate on the first hair test. This occurs commonly. After one or several tests, the oxidation rate may become very slow or very fast, indicating severe energy loss. However, the patient reports feeling better.

    In this case, the body had compensated for nutrient imbalances by accumulating toxic metals that temporarily balanced the oxidation rate.

Cadmium, for example, will raise sodium levels. Lead can replace calcium. In spite of a fairly balanced oxidation rate, the person did not feel well because of the presence of the toxic metals, often hidden deep within the tissues.

As body chemistry improved, the body began to eliminate the toxic metals, replacing them with physiological minerals. The person begins to feel better. Yet the oxidation rate may reveal the underlying imbalance and look worse for a while.

2. Symptom relief. A second reason the test may look worse but the patient feels better is if the patient gains relief from an important symptom. This may produce psychological well-being in the patient, even though other imbalances exist.

3. Not reading the test carefully enough. A third reason for an apparent worsening of the test in spite of symptomatic improvement is the practitioner may not understand how to interpret the new test.

4. Higher toxic metals. For example, higher toxic metals usually means one is actively eliminating of metals, not a worsening of toxicity. An unbalanced oxidation rate may grab one's attention, causing one to overlook an improved sodium/potassium ratio or improved phosphorus or zinc level.

5. Uncovering a deeper layer of imbalances. This occurs often on hair mineral tests. The main reason is that imbalances in body chemistry are unwound or uncovered layer by layer. Often, a superficial layer does not appear that abnormal. However, a deeper layer reveals hidden toxic metals and other imbalances that are more aberrant.

This is not a cause for alarm, but for gratitude that one is uncovering and correcting deeper imbalances. Usually one feels better as these are uncovered, as it means one must no longer spend energy compensating and adapting to underlying imbalances. Adaptive energy that was tied up in this way is now freed and one often feels better.

In those following a development program, blood, urine and other tests may also be skewed temporarily as the unwinding of layers of adaptations proceeds. One simply addresses the imbalances that are present without placing too much emphasis on the seemingly worsened appearance of the mineral or other test.

LITTLE CHANGE ON A RETEST

    There are several reasons why there may be little change in the hair test, but the patient feels better. Possible reasons include:

1. It’s too soon to notice. A diet, supplement or lifestyle change increases well-being, but has not yet impacted body chemistry enough to show up on the test. Remember that a hair analysis is a picture of the past three months or so of a person’s body chemistry. Recent changes may take an extra month or two to show up on a retest.

2. Faulty Interpretation. The practitioner overlooks a subtle improved ratio or level.

3. Averaging. The change may be too subtle to see on one test. For example, a copper level that is rising from 2.5 mg% to 8.5 mg% over the 3 month sampling period will be averaged resulting in a reading of 5.5 mg%.

Over the next 3 months, a decrease in the copper level from 9 mg% to 2 mg% will be averaged to also produce a reading of 5.5 mg%. The reading will be the same, but the meaning is very different!

The only way to detect such a subtle change would be to retest sooner. Eventually, of course, the trend in body chemistry will be revealed, but on a temporary basis it can seem as though nothing has changed.

4. Faulty hair sampling. The hair was not sampled correctly. This should not happen if instructions for sampling hair are followed to the letter. However, if someone sends in a long hair sample, it may be old. A sample cut away from the scalp will not show recent changes.

THE RETEST LOOKS BETTER, BUT THE PERSON FEELS WORSE OR THE SAME

    A person with an improved retest can feel worse for several reasons.

1. Retracing reactions. The most common reason is a healing reaction or retracing reaction. This can give rise to many kinds of symptoms.

Most do not last long, but chronic conditions may require months for retracing. One patient began to dissolve old kidney stones, which then began to pass, causing extreme discomfort until all had passed.

2. Ridding the body of a latent condition. With a development program, unlike most other nutrition or healing regimens, the body corrects the most important imbalances first. The most important imbalance may not be one’s main symptom, however.

Therefore, one may not feel better immediately, even though positive change is occurring. Some understanding of the correction process is required in order to continue with the program in spite of little apparent symptom change.

For example, a latent condition might be a partially clogged artery or an early cancer. These conditions usually have no obvious symptoms and one is unaware of the developing pathology.

Since there are no obvious symptoms of pathology, one is also often not aware of the correction of the latent pathology either. Therefore, one might think that nothing has occurred after a few months on a program, when in fact an important healing has occurred. The hair analysis may be the only indicator of the healing.

Meanwhile, one’s more ‘pressing’ symptoms may not change. In reality, these may be much less important, however, than healing the latent heart attack.

3. A higher level of awareness of symptoms. This is a common occurrence on our programs. Many people are not are of their health or their energy level when beginning a development program. As they progress, however, they become far more aware of their bodies.

With this comes awareness of problems, aches and pains and other symptoms. This can make a person believe they are worse, when really they are simply more in touch with the body and the mind as well.

4. New stress factors. As health improves, new challenges may occur in a person’s life, creating anxiety or other symptoms.

5. The person may have forgotten some of his original complaints. This is far more common, in our experience, than one might imagine.

For this reason, it is always wise for practitioners to keep a written record of all symptoms and conditions at the beginning of treatment. Then, when a person says there is no improvement or they are feeling worse, you can refer to this sheet and ask about each symptom. Often half are gone and forgotten.

6. The person increased their activity level. This is common with fatigued patients who are anxious to get back to their old routine. As they improve, they increase their activities, using up the extra energy they gained. As a result, they may not feel better. Careful questioning may reveal an increased activity level, needing fewer naps, or some other subtle improvement.

HAIR ANALYSIS PATTERNS ON RETESTS

We have identified dozens of hair mineral patterns that are revealed only on retest hair mineral analyses. Many are rather interesting. All of them are listed on the Read Articles page of this website in alphabetical order. When we find a new pattern, we add it there. A few of the important ones are:

1. Back In the Tunnel

2. Settling Down Pattern

3. Kidney Stress pattern

4. Elimination Of Metastatic Calcium

5. Getting Rid Of The Crutches

6. Coming Alive

7. Emerging From Four Lows

8. Flip Over Pattern (big change in the oxidation rate or the sodium/potassium ratio

9. An explosion or surge

Home | Hair Analysis | Saunas | Books | Articles | Detox Protocols

Courses | About Dr. Wilson | The Free Basic Program