I would like to emphasize that I did not actually read his books but mostly came to it through self-experimentation, comparing DMPS and DMSA and various ways to take them, and trying different ways more than once before forming an opinion (just for my own body and situation of course). I read the descriptions of the protocol on the Internet, which is simple enough: focus on keeping a somewhat even blood level of small doses of chelator by taking small (<100 mg max., much less at the start) doses every 3 hours during the day, every 4 hours during the night (lower metabolism allows to disturb ones sleep less). That's pretty much it.

I ignored all the rest, I think he recommends quite a few supplements. Also, I did not trust any person's advice. I tried it all on myself to see what actually worked. The only thing that I had clinical evidence for, according to my doctor, was the infrequent high-dose DMPS treatment, so for anything else I was on my own (not trusting Internet forum comments reporting success for this or that, including Cutler).

I did quite a few experiments, including a few times attempting to use DMSA capsules pulse dose, >500mg all at once and only one time, which a lot of doctors here (those few that use chelation) recommend. With that method I had significant side effects for days, unlike with the Cutler method. I found the minimum of three days that Cutler recommends to really be the absolute minimum, but I would set a better minimum at five days. I mostly did at least 7 days and up to three weeks at a time - with no little substitution of anything except for some (very little) zinc. No signs of a lack of zinc, ever, and just to be sure I read all I could about possibly symptoms. Of course, different people may have different results, apparently my body can compensate, probably by excreting less zinc and by getting more from food.

Also, I deviated from Cutler in two ways: One, he say that one should stop a round when one misses a dose by more than half an hour. I thought about it and the only way that that made sense was when I see it as a "psychological" rule, he wanted to prevent people from thinking "oh it doesn't matter" because a lot of people would drop a few doses if it was made too easy. However, when you genuinely miss a dose and ignore that larger problem it does not make sense to stop. Second, when my problems became less and my body "learned" the rhythm, and I didn't actually need an alarm any more, and when my body showed that it learned to "use" the rhythm, shortening the periods between waking up in times of greater stress all on its own (and more so at the beginning of sleep), I experimented with turning off the nightly alarm completely and letting my brain decide on its own whether it was better to wake up or to continue sleep past the four hour period. It turned out to feel much better. I have to emphasize that I only did this after my brain had proven for years that it had not just accepted the rhythm, but actively "used it", not just enduring it.

I've heard lots of bad stuff about high dose protocols and injections. It's been a lot of years since I was an active participant on a chelation list. I never pursued a formal chelation protocol, nor read any of Cutler's books.

But a word to the wise: Improper chelation has a nasty track record of making things worse. It's not really a good problem space for randomly trying stuff and seeing what works.

Here in Germany those doctors that offer it have significant experience with DMPS injections though. After my own experiences, I'd say that for many people - and I dare go beyond my experiences based on the experiences of those said doctors, which I know because my own doc, as a researcher, is in a good position to see them, and also is one of those offering courses for other doctors - DMPS injections seem to work pretty well at least for the hard initial part.

For example, there is a pattern that at first levels measured an hour after injection (DMPS is quickly excreted, mostly through kidneys) after the first couple of injections drop, but then suddenly jump up. That seems to be a sign that now the body starts its own "detox", which seems to have been overwhelmed and now, through the DMPS injections freed again. I had exactly this, after the fourth or fifth injection my values tripled after having decreased linearly, and my body became very "active" (including that thyroid, see my initial post).

I also had areas of jaw bone that were severely broken - a subcutaneous needle for buccal mucosa injection penetrated deep into the bone in several places, a very, very bad sign (you cannot penetrate bone with a small needle, not unless it's already severely disintegrating). My doctor injected DMPS right there, not deliberately breaking into bone, only where the needle easily penetrated on its own, with very little pressure. That started a lot of activity in my jaw bones, and after a year he could no longer penetrate the bone. My jaw bone issues, some of them existing for decades, continued to diminish and have now almost completely disappeared (and the rest will be gone too in time). All thanks to DMPS injections.

Opinion of those doctors here doing research and writing the books is that DMPS injections are orders of magnitude faster. From my experience I would agree. I still did (and do) DMPS injections, very infrequently, and there's a lot more happening all at once compared to low-dose DMSA. The method is heavily used here and experiences are good. Those doctors using it communicate quite a bit. I think if they saw danger they would have noticed by now. The method has been in use for decades now. Max Daunderer, a clinical toxicologist, came up with it originally during years of practice and that's the reason this is being used here so much.

Even more: During the harder years sometimes I ran into a road block with DMSA and Cutler. Then taking a DMPS injection quickly removed the symptoms and cleared the way to go back to DMSA and Cutler.