lead levels - call from state health department

[jsheyn]

I recently had a lead blood level done and it was high (35 micrograms/dL) now I have the Pennsylvania health department calling me for details....any guidance fro you experienced folks?

[dilly]

My understanding is that physiological lead exposure often comes from spent primers or tumbling media. That very fine dust can be taken into your circulatory system more readily than... ingots.

Are your practices with respect to tumbling media and spent primers very clean? That's where I would start looking.

Is there any chance it could come from occupational hazards?

[jsheyn]

I shoot indoors usualy so I imagine I am getting it there I dont cast that often

I guess really what the question is-is how to deal the PA deptament of health....

[IraqVet1982]

You are not obligated to speak with them. Tell them you wish to decline unless you want to talk to them.

[mikeym1a]

If you don't cast, that leaves out the melted lead part. What about reloading? Do you reload? do you tumble your cases? What the department of health is going to want to know is where you were exposed to this lead? I would contact the indoor range where you shoot and let them know of this. they should have a ventilation/filtration system in the range. And again, are you exposed to lead at work? All of this is a subject of concern. As I said, the Dept. of health is gonna want to know how you were exposed to this high level of lead. There are treatments, called chelation, to remove the heavy metals from the body. link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelation_therapy. You can also buy home chelation tablet over the internet. these take much longer. Good luck with this. Make sure you followup with your doctor. mikey

[Idz]

Federal OSHA rules are <20 ug/dL for adult general population, <40 ug/dL for occupational exposure and action level of >60 ug/dL. For children they usually want <10 ug/dL although some states say 5 or less. If you grew up before all the lead bans (paint, gasoline, etc) in the 1970s and you worked with lead your level isn't 'high' by federal standards. It seems to vary a lot by individual where for identical occupational exposures one person may have 5 ug/dL and another have 20 or more.

[R.M.]

They just want to know if it's occupational, so they can send OSHA in. Just tell them it from recreation and they'll leave you be.

[jsheyn]

Thanks for the quick responses...I feela little better the DOH isnt going raid my house :D

I am a desk jocky, so not a work related
I cast but maybe once a month, I reload nightly
I do use a tumbler with a sealed lid
I do spend about 5 a week shooting indoors ..range has 3 very large ventilation fans that we run (when on you can feel a breeze)

only thing I do is take a break during shooring I have a cup of coffee....but I always go scrub up with Lava soap before break time

[EDG]

If you shoot indoors with a group of others you might consider their exposure too.
It sounds like the range might need to improve its ventilation.

[Janoosh]

+1 idz....you couldn't have said it more clearly. Imho don't say anything..the dept is just compiling numbers...to.our detriment..

[Elkins45]

If they call back just tell them that the flavor of latex paint chips just isn't as good as the genuine lead-based paint chips you grew up eating.
:kidding:

Seriously, do talk to your doctor about lowering your exposure. I'm no health Nazi but I do know you want to minimize any sort of heavy metals inside your tissues if you can.

[dbosman]

Also, how old you are may be an issue for your doctor and possibly the PHD.

[jonp]

My first question would be how they got your confidential medical records and test results in yhe first place. My second can not be posted but go fly a kite is another way of putting it

[johnho]

I got the same call a number of years ago here in FL. I refused to tell her anything. We chatted for awhile and all she was really wanting to know is if it was work place related. I told her no it wasn't. She told me to eat green vegetables to lower it. She was pretty nice about it and I finally told her about shooting and casting bullets. I couldn't see anything wrong with finally telling her. I did ask how she found out and she told me that anytime a high level comes in to the doctor or lab (not sure which really) that they are required by law to report it. I guess it's like suspected child abuse or spouse abuse laws (ok, alleged abuse). Never got a call back, but then again I paid more attention to care and it gradually came back down to normal.

[dkf]

Tell them you threw away the lead bowl use eat cereal from every morning away when you got the lead test results.:kidding:

[fredj338]

I shoot indoors usualy so I imagine I am getting it there I dont cast that often

I guess really what the question is-is how to deal the PA deptament of health....
Yeah, I would tell them to pound sand. It's likely your indoor range, worst place for lead exposure, primarily form the priming compounds & poor ventilation. Check your tap water though. If you live in an older house, your piping could be lead wiped galv or copper pipe? I would want to know how they got your personal med data?? What happened to Dr/patient confidentiality??
Limit your indoor range time, regardless of how well it's ventilated. Consider wearing at least a N95 dust filter, better than nothing. Exercise, eat better. Smokers are more vulnerable than non smokers. You can also try a mild form of detox using Betonite Clay. It helps remove heavy metals from your system. I have been casting & shooting for 35yrs, very little of it indoors. My lead level was 10 last year.

[destrux]

I'd tell them you heard on the internet that eating fishing sinkers helped with digestion but you stopped now because it made swimming too difficult.

[xacex]

Lead glass decanters I keep my booze in probably do not do me any good. Good thing it doesn't last long.

[kevmc]

You are not obligated to speak with them. Tell them you wish to decline unless you want to talk to them.

X2! "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help......"

[shooter93]

Tell them it started right after you were following the State trucks that were painting the lines on the roads. Then ask them who you should file the suit against....they'll go away...lol.

[I'll Make Mine]

For whatever it's worth, there's probably a state law requiring labs or health care providers to report certain test results, like positive for syphilis or HIV, lead above a certain level, or environmental pollutants above certain levels (just as hospital emergency rooms are required to notify law enforcement for any gunshot wound, even if it appears accidental). As noted above, for lead it's mainly a concern about occupational exposure, as well as to ensure lay folk are notified they shouldn't drink orange juice out of that absolutely gorgeous pot they brought back from Mexico last year.

If you can't avoid talking to them, tell them you suspect it was due to primers on an indoor range (the truth); you could save the other shooters at the same range a lot of grief with the very slight risk of the range closing if the management can't afford the ventilation upgrade needed. Or, the state might check and find the range isn't the source and notify you of a need to check other factors in your own activities.

[762 shooter]

When I had my test about 5 years ago after smelting for the previous year, my results came back as 2 micrograms/dL.

My doc said that anything over 20 they had to report to DHEC.

OSHA with nose problems to protect us from ourselves. Don't get me started. None of their business.

Don't get your local ranges in trouble by mentioning them. Ask them to submit any questions in printed form and tell them that you and your attorney would see if you needed to answer them.

Or just tell them you like to munch on lead.

762

[ubetcha]

I had read something about vitamin B12 was supposed to help purge lead from your system also. Now that was many years ago and don't remember where I read it.

[osteodoc08]

AFAIK, it's not a reportable medical condition. At least not in GA anyhow.

Its none of their dang business. Time to find a new doc......

[jeepyj]

I would simply say my hobby's include chewing on windowsills and other paint chips in my old house :)
jeepyj

[Grizzly Adams]

8-)8-)

[MtGun44]

Hobby exposure, but you need to stop eating, drinking or smoking around your casting, sizing and loading
operation, unless you shoot a LOT at an indoor range. Absolutely no need to be this high, with just a bit
of care not to EAT lead inadvertently, should be down around 5 or 10.

Less than 40 is OK, if there is a reason and it is monitored, for adults. Idz is giving the straight scoop, many
folks (including a lot of docs) are pretty ignorant on this topic, stick to the children's number of 10 for everyone
which is not correct.

Bill

[zuke]

Haven't you spent too much time casting sinker's and tin soldier's?
I personally think it's from your tumbler media,unless you use SS media.

[jonp]

I wonder how high mine was as a kid. I was always at a beaver pond or trout stream biting closed splitshot sinkers.

Its a wonder any of us ever reached adulthood without the government to help and guide us

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I've heard that Vit C will flush Lead out of your system.
http://www.lead.org.au/lanv10n2/lanv10n2-2.html

[Old Caster]

I guarantee it is from the indoor range and if you just quit going there, it will go back down to normal without chelation. Whether it is from bullets hitting the backstop and turning into dust or from the primers is a moot point. You can continue casting and tumbling all you want.

[leadman]

I followed the Minnesota diet for children exposed to lead and it lowered my level in a couple of months.
Go to Home depot or similar and buy a home test kit to detect lead and test your reloading/casting area. I also took a piece of aluminum plate that was handy, cleaned it, use the test swab on it to make sure there was no lead, and then taped it to the front of my shirt while I cast and made shot. It showed lead with another swab after about an hour. You could do similar while you are shooting.
Your level is high enough you should be concerned about it and try to lower it. One side effect that is not well known is high lead levels can cause high blood pressure. Happened to me. The base of my fingernails also turned a purple hue. Funny taste in my mouth and my teeth felt strange.
Good luck and take care of yourself.

[bangerjim]

One way to minimize exposure is to powder coat all your boolits. Once coated, any handling cannot impart lead to your hands or area. But shooting in a poor ventilated range is probably your culprit.

bangerjim

[bedbugbilly]

jonp - your comment about how they got the information in the first place is very interesting.

I've been going through some health issues in the last three months - I don't think any of us really have a grasp as to what is going on with the new "O care". I have had to see a number of doctors and what I have run across is that my "information" is already "known" by some locations where I know they did not have my permission to obtain it.

We are on my wife's retirement insurance (not quite old enough for MediCare) where our information is supposed to be private. For the last year and a half, both my wife and I have been bombarded by calls and forms sent to us urging is to apply for SS Disability - these are coming from a company that has been contracted by the insurance company. The contractor has my information (I've been diabetic for 48 years) which I consider a violation of the privacy act. Long story short - the insurance company wants their clients to go on SS Disability so that they will no longer have to cover them.

In the past three months, I can't believe some of the literally "stupid" forms I have had to fill out - all part of the O care requirements which affect everyone. The doctors are frustrated and all this new program has done has passed on a lot of expenses for fulfilling what the government wants.

If anyone thinks there is "privacy" . . . . better think again. There is no such thing as "privacy" anymore . . . and it's just going to get worse. After all . . . we are all so inept that the "government must be our keeper". Funny thing though . . . when I went to school (back when we started each day with the Pledge to our flag and a short prayer) . . . I was taught that the "government" was the "people" . . . . but then we were also taught about the Constitution as well . . . something that today's politicians seem to have never received.

As far as the lead . . . I'd talk with my personal physician about it and see what they say. What about your source of drinking water - at work and at home? Your diet? There are lots of factors that could be involved. Good luck to you and let us know how it works out.

[dondiego]

I had heard that he had been eating Kalifornia condor corpses.

[dakotashooter2]

Tell them you make cast soldiers for the kids down at the orphanage.......................LOL............... ...........

[Kraschenbirn]

....many folks (including a lot of docs) are pretty ignorant on this topic, stick to the children's number of 10 for everyone which is not correct.

Yup!! A couple years back, I went round and round with my 'Personal Care Physician' about this. I began lead testing as part of my annual physical when I was shooting indoor bullseye about nine months out of the year and continued the practice after I 'retired' from competition. For some reason, my lead level 'spiked' (all the way up to 14.5 ug/dl) and, in the eyes of my 'Health Care Provider' this was some kind of major issue. Turned out, as MtGun44 suggested, they were using the 10 ug/dl children's standard as a base number for ALL lead testing...and this from a "nationally-ranked Top 50 Hospital"!! To get the issue settled, I had to provide hard copies of both the NIH and OSHA standards to 'prove' they'd misinterpreted my test results.

In the end, though, the whole thing may have been a case of bungled testing...90 days later, I (re)tested at 7.2 ug/dl; right where I'd been for the previous 6 or 7 years.

Bill

[dondiego]

Due to my 32 years of experience in a chemistry test lab setting, most of which involved the review of reported test data, I have always requested suspect data to be run again for confirmation or even have a new, separate sample re-analyzed. You would be surprised at the number of mistakes made in reported data. Not saying that we had poor chemists or analytical equipment or poor QC, it's just that they had thousands of samples to analyze and even one minor mistake can have a huge impact on someone!

[Idz]

I see in the OSHA regulations that certified lead testing labs have to be able to test blood within +/- 6ug/dL so one test getting 7.2 and another at 14.5 could be measuring almost identical amounts. I assume Bill's test numbers were micrograms=ug=mmg=0.000001 grams not milligrams=mg=0.001 gram otherwise he's in rough shape.

[mdi]

Lead in yer blood doesn't come only from shooting or casting. I'm sure there are many other factors (a weldor at work had very high lead levels, but that was because he worked with/welded on paint that had lead in it; school bus yellow on out water utility vehicles).

[Harter66]

I looked at chelation after a 2nd high test. The problem there is that by doing that you can wash otherwise stationary non-issue lead and other things out and actually cause a huge spike. I have a friend that had his annual blood work done and showed both a cholesteral and liver enzime at high levels turns out it was from a weekend of beer ,omlets,and potato salad.
My lead has run high for several yr but at work I was surounded by pre-74' oxidized od green boxes, cans, pallets, racks,equiptment, and ammo. Shocked was I......or not I was probably soaking it up out of the dust etc on sweating skin. The folks here also flag on airport swipes 50/50 over a yr after leaving the jobs. My daughter flagged a sniffer for assorted nitro items from my work clothes being done in general laundry ultimately we should have probably had 2 washers. I guess my point is that a diet shift w/a bunch of OJ ,tomatoes , and any 1 or 2 of the spinach family can cause a spike as well as any number of exposure points . Where is the ink,paper ,office coffee ,copier toner, etc etc from? You might be suprised how easy it is for 2-3 simple exposures to add up quickly.

Blame it on Bush.....I mean a weekend of camping and fishing before the test and follow up in 6 weeks to 3 mo to see if its still high then let the HD draw from that. It could be from wood smoke.....

[jsheyn]

I called my doc requesting to know why my private info was provided to the PA DOH....I was told the lab is obligated for certain tests showing high levels to be reported...The lady I spoke to stated STD's (I quickly asked her what she was implying) is one and test that that must be report and lead is another.

After a while I spoke with the doc and he stated I am classified as having lead poising and also said that I should minimize my indoor shooting. He also said at this point he does not feel I need any sort of treatment unless I develop symptoms.

I am a diabetic and get my blood drawn every 3 months. I think I will try some of the suggestions offered up here and see if the levels come done....I’m not going to stop shooting indoors..but I’ll surely leave the door open to create a better draft.

[fredj338]

I've heard that Vit C will flush Lead out of your system.
http://www.lead.org.au/lanv10n2/lanv10n2-2.html

VitC helps, as does eating leafy greens, high fiber diet & a quarterly detox with something like Betonite clay. Unlike chelation, it doesn't remove everything from your system, only positive ion charged particles, heavy metals. BS, who knows, but certainly can't hurt. Fruit pectins are another supplement that can help.
http://wellnessmama.com/5915/the-benefits-of-healing-clays/
(http://wellnessmama.com/5915/the-benefits-of-healing-clays/)I shun the indoor ranges, but do shoot quite a bit & with handgun, almost all lead bullets. So taking precautions is prudent.

[wacki]

My first question would be how they got your confidential medical records and test results in yhe first place. My second can not be posted but go fly a kite is another way of putting it


Confidential is is a faux word when the fed.gov is involved.

[I'll Make Mine]

I called my doc requesting to know why my private info was provided to the PA DOH....I was told the lab is obligated for certain tests showing high levels to be reported...The lady I spoke to stated STD's (I quickly asked her what she was implying) is one and test that that must be report and lead is another.

After a while I spoke with the doc and he stated I am classified as having lead poising and also said that I should minimize my indoor shooting. He also said at this point he does not feel I need any sort of treatment unless I develop symptoms.

I am a diabetic and get my blood drawn every 3 months. I think I will try some of the suggestions offered up here and see if the levels come done....I’m not going to stop shooting indoors..but I’ll surely leave the door open to create a better draft.

Exactly as I suggested -- it's a law enacted to "protect" children, so they can be taken from their parents if the parents "choose" to live in a century-old house that still has lead paint (say, because they can afford the rent and still keep the lights on and food in the cupboards). You might also double check whether your doc (and lab) are reporting you based on the children's standard. Based on posts back up the thread, you're below the adult standard even for OSHA. You might also want to consider changing docs -- if he thinks you're "poisoned" but then in the next breath says you don't need treatment until you develop symptoms, that sounds like he doesn't actually know anything about lead poisoning...

[Garyshome]

Time to use rubber gloves more. Me that is!

[Gypsyrt]

Eat more Green Veggies the lead levels will drop.

[jsheyn]

Thanks everyone for the great responses. ..

[opos]

Thought I'd ask a follow on question and see if anyone can shed some light...First I'm an old man with some serious lung issues...I do not cast for that reason but do load a lot of 45Colt and 38/357 commercial lead (softer stuff ...12 hard and so on) and do some shooting indoors...I'm not a really active shooter so maybe a couple times a month.

I've been loading for a long time and grew up without a tumbler..(have one now with walnut shells and corncob mix)...doing the "vinegar/water/soap" wash...I still dump all my spent brass in a "citrus bath" after shooting and then give it a final "whirl" in the tumbler just for looks and ease of seeing defects, after depriming with a dedicated depriming die. I'd guess the washing (and I'm careful of residue..wear latex gloves) would get rid of a lot of lead and carbon impurities and depriming before tumbling in walnut/corncob mixture would seem to not have much residual lead in it..any thoughts on this? I've not had any lead checks with the doc as I've never had any "symptoms" I've read about...I know my way is not "effecient" but been doing this for a long time and so far it seems ok. Just wondering if anyone else does similar things and had any lead issues..thanks

[Old Caster]

....I’m not going to stop shooting indoors..but I’ll surely leave the door open to create a better draft.

If you don't want to stop just wear a mask that is made for this problem. Quite a few of the people I know do this. I no longer shoot indoors but mostly because it is too far away and I never have high lead anymore and it was as high as 40. If I was to shoot indoors anymore I would wear the mask and not worry about it.

[Old Caster]

Thought I'd ask a follow on question and see if anyone can shed some light...First I'm an old man with some serious lung issues...I do not cast for that reason but do load a lot of 45Colt and 38/357 commercial lead (softer stuff ...12 hard and so on) and do some shooting indoors...I'm not a really active shooter so maybe a couple times a month.

I've been loading for a long time and grew up without a tumbler..(have one now with walnut shells and corncob mix)...doing the "vinegar/water/soap" wash...I still dump all my spent brass in a "citrus bath" after shooting and then give it a final "whirl" in the tumbler just for looks and ease of seeing defects, after depriming with a dedicated depriming die. I'd guess the washing (and I'm careful of residue..wear latex gloves) would get rid of a lot of lead and carbon impurities and depriming before tumbling in walnut/corncob mixture would seem to not have much residual lead in it..any thoughts on this? I've not had any lead checks with the doc as I've never had any "symptoms" I've read about...I know my way is not "effecient" but been doing this for a long time and so far it seems ok. Just wondering if anyone else does similar things and had any lead issues..thanks

The people like me that have had high lead levels, shot 2 or possibly 3 times a week in Bullseye matches which might take a couple of hours a time each outing. Doing what you are doing is not risky. Now I cast a lot and shoot outdoors a lot. I reload a lot of bullets (4-5 thousand a year, all cast) and usually I just put my brass into the tumbler in the basement and rarely with citric acid and my lead levels are never high.

[tazman]

If you don't want to stop just wear a mask that is made for this problem. Quite a few of the people I know do this. I no longer shoot indoors but mostly because it is too far away and I never have high lead anymore and it was as high as 40. If I was to shoot indoors anymore I would wear the mask and not worry about it.

Excellent suggestion.
For casting, good ventilation is the key. A small fan, hood, or open window with even just a little air movement blowing the fumes, smoke, dust, whatever away from you will do the job.
For loading, cleanliness is the key. Wash your hands before you eat, smoke or drink and you should have no problems.

[deltaenterprizes]

Do you smoke? Lead can transfer from your hands to the cigarette and inhaled that way.

[Garyshome]

Tell them to stop Fracking!