Chapter 6. THE HEALTH OF THE NERVES +to many diseases/illnesses & Researc

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from the Book: Magnesium, The Nutrient That Could Change Your Life

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Chapter 6. THE HEALTH OF THE NERVES

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Think of all the jobs the nervous system must perform. Every activity of

life, from the respiration of a single cell, to a gross motor function such as

piloting an aircraft, is controlled by the nerves.

 

Yet nutrition as it applies to the nerves is a sadly neglected affair. Any

schoolchild knows he needs plenty of protein for muscle, vitamin C for healthy

gums, and calcium for strong bones. But ask him what foods are good for his

nerves and chances are he doesn't know. Fortunately, the fats, proteins, and

vitamins that are needed for healthy nerve tissue are fairly abundant in the

diet. However, one nutrient that recent research has found to be lacking in

the diets of most people, and which lack may be the cause, of so much nervous

illness, is magnesium. Information on, the essentiality of magnesium to the

nerves was published by Penn and Loewenstein of Columbia University in Science

(January, 1966), and will be discussed in a later chapter. Taking advantage

of new advances in electronic measuring techniques, the scientists studied the

electrical conduction of currents by the nerves. Their most important

finding was that while calcium is the prime conductor of these minute

electrical

currents, it is magnesium that maintains normal levels of calcium in the

system.

 

How does magnesium regulate calcium levels? Inside the body, these two

minerals are positively charged. When they come into contact with negatively

charged particles, an electrical current is formed. It is believed that fatty

acids comprising the major portion of nerve tissue are negatively charged. It

is

for this reason, then, that calcium and magnesium supplies must be constantly

renewed; without them, the flow of current by the nerves cannot be

maintained.

 

In, like fashion, a storage battery **works** only when a positive and a

negative electrode are present to maintain an electrical current. When the

positive plates become exhausted, the battery is no longer any good. By this

same

mechanism, small amounts of electrical currents flow from the calcium ion to

the negatively charged nerve lipids. When magnesium levels are low, the

calcium supply becomes exhausted, and in the absence of adequate calcium, the

nerve cells cease to function.

 

Calms the Nerves

 

Magnesium works in other ways to preserve the health of the nervous system.

By the twentieth century, doctors had learned that magnesium injections exert

a depressant effect upon the nerves. In fact, one of the early uses of the

mineral was to induce sleep. It is significant that hibernating animals have

very high magnesium levels. Magnesium has also been shown effective in

controlling convulsions, in pregnant women, epileptic seizures, and **the

shakes**

in alcoholics.

 

Yet one of the paradoxical effects of the mineral upon the nerves is that a

magnesium-deficient person who takes magnesium feels more energetic than

before, even though the mineral is a depressant and not a stimulant. Actually,

magnesium relieves the nervous irritability and excessive energy that give rise

to fatigue in the first place.

 

It should not be surprising, then, that when a person's magnesium level is

subnormal, the nerves are unable to control such functions as muscle movement,

respiration, and mental processes. Twitching, irregular heartbeat,

irritability, and nervous fatigue are symptoms of what is frequently found to

be

magnesium depletion.

 

Most often, deficiency is simply a result of failure to obtain adequate

magnesium from such dietary sources as wheat germ, cocoa, desiccated liver,

eggs,

green vegetables, soybeans, and almonds. In some instances, however,

absorption of nutrients can be impaired by coexisting illness, such as an

intestinal

infection. In such an event, much of the ingested magnesium may be lost from

the body.

 

A Host of Disorders

 

A case history presented in the Archives of Neurology (June, 1965) by Dr.

Robert Fishman of New York illustrates just how **inadequate dietary intake

coupled with excess gastrointestinal loss** can lead to a host of nervous

disorders.

 

A 29-year-old man suffering from intestinal trouble for six years finally

had large portions of the large and small colon removed. Six months later, he

was readmitted to the hospital for a broken vertebra resulting from a

**generalized convulsion** he had experienced during sleep. Dr. Fishman writes:

**During the week prior to admission, he was noted by his family to be

increasingly irritable and mildly confused, and to have twitching of the muscles

of the

face, hands, and feet.**

 

The patient, described as **agitated** and **anxious,** soon suffered a

second convulsion. His pulse was 140 beats per minute (70 is average). After

injections of magnesium sulfate were administered, his restlessness and

neuromuscular difficulty disappeared. As bowel function improved, his need for

magnesium gradually diminished.

 

Animals, too, can develop neurological damage when their diet is deficient

in magnesium. Grass tetany results when cattle cannot obtain magnesium in

ample amounts from chlorophyll, the green coloring matter in grass. Muscle

spasms, frothing at the mouth, hypersensitivity, increased pulse rate, and

fatal

convulsions may occur in prolonged depletion.

 

Sometimes magnesium deficiency can cause disorders so severe that massive

doses of magnesium by injection are required. High doses of injected magnesium,

however, can cause profound depression of the entire nervous system and,

ultimately, respiratory paralysis. The possibility of this danger is increased

when a pregnant woman develops preeclampsia.

 

This condition, which affects about one in 500 pregnant women, may consist

of convulsions, nausea, dizziness, and headache. It is believed that defective

chemical substances in the blood or products derived from the placenta are

unable to be excreted properly and may cause harm to the fetus. It has become

almost routine for hospitals to inject the mother with magnesium to control

eclamptic convulsions and to facilitate kidney function.

 

The uses of magnesium for nerve health still require further research, but

even from the results of the few studies already made, we can be certain that

unless our bodies are adequately fortified with this mineral, the nervous

system can degenerate seriously.

 

A good supply of dolomite, meat, eggs, fruits, nuts, and vegetables can help

to lessen the chances of developing nervous conditions that stem from a

magnesium imbalance.

 

During 1966, there were published in The Lancet an article and successive

letters dealing with a degenerative nervous disease that was observed among

patients in Nigeria, one of the larger African countries. The original article

by a Nigerian doctor, Professor Monekosso, described the disease carefully

and, in effect, appealed for help in treating it. The disease was characterized

by **mental apathy and depression; ataxia [loss of coordination]; decreased

motor power, bulk, and tone; foot drop and wrist drop; calk tenderness, and

limbs cold to the touch.** The senses of touch and hearing were also impaired.

 

The symptoms were clearly suggestive of a form of beriberi, the thiamine

(vitamin B1)deficiency disease, and sure enough, on investigation it turned out

that the thiamine intake of these patients was inadequate. However,

administration of either thiamine alone or vitamin B complex did not cure them.

 

One of the later letters commenting on this article was written by Dr. Joan

Caddell of the George Washington School of Medicine in Washington, D.C. It

was published in the October 1, 1966, issue of The Lancet. It was the opinion

of Dr. Caddell that magnesium deficiency was probably involved because of the

essential role of magnesium in the biosynthesis and activation of thiamine

pyrophosphate. . . . What she was really saying was that sometimes a thiamine

deficiency is caused by a deficiency of magnesium and therefore it will not be

cured by the administration of thiamine alone. Quoting her own experience in

Nigeria, she stated:

 

**Malnourished young Nigerian children from the same cultural group as the

above [Monekosso] patients developed a similar syndrome, often with more acute

features. The children had had severe, prolonged gastroenteritis and had

received a diet of cornstarch and cassava. Vitamin-B enriched protein-milk

therapy aggravated the syndrome, sometimes with the development of staring,

nysthemus, ataxia, tremors, or convulsions. Magnesium deficiency was

biochemically

established by analysis of skeletal muscle and plasma. The symptoms were

reversed after addition of magnesium to the therapy.**

 

The exchange provides an excellent illustration of how much medicine has yet

to learn about the many roles of magnesium in human metabolism and its

indispensability to general health. The fact is that, as new studies are

published

and new discoveries made, it is becoming clearer and clearer that magnesium

is one of the basic nutrients needed for a healthy nervous system and

therefore almost any affliction in any part of the body might turn out to be

actually an illness of the nerves that are involved because they are deficient

in

magnesium.

 

Epilepsy is one good example of this. As far back as recorded history goes,

the **falling disease** has been one of the great mysteries of medicine.

While dozens and hundreds of other illnesses responded to investigation,

epilepsy

remained unexplained and untreatable by any known method. It, is only within

the past year that there has been published work revealing that epilepsy is

accompanied by a lower than normal level of magnesium in the spinal fluid,

and that administration of magnesium can be expected to bring about quick

improvement. It is a field that still requires much investigation, but present

indications are that deficient magnesium in the spine, and the subsequent

effect

on major nerves of the spine running to and from the brain, may be the

actual cause of epilepsy. Later in this book we will see that this work

emerging

from the Hereford Clinic and Deaf Smith Research Foundation in Hereford,

Texas, under the direction of Lewis B. Barnett, M.D., further establishes

wide-range effects that magnesium nutrition has on the nervous system.

 

Deficiency Caused Convulsions

 

Most recently, there was published in The Lancet (April 1, 1967), a case

history of a newborn infant who developed convulsions because a metabolic

abnormality did not permit the child to utilize its magnesium intake properly.

**On

three occasions withdrawing or decreasing magnesium supplements led to a

fall in both plasma-magnesium and plasma-calcium levels and to recurrence of

the

convulsions.** This is more evidence that if the nervous system is deprived

of adequate magnesium the entire person will suffer for it.

 

If additional evidence were needed that healthy nerves require magnesium, it

would certainly be supplied by the recent investigational studies entering

into the development of **memory pills** at the Abbott Laboratories in

Chicago. Memory, of course, is one of the primary and most important functions

of

the human nervous system. And the stimulant to memory and other mental function

that is being developed at Abbott has magnesium as its basis.

 

In other recent studies we have learned that the motor nerves--those that

carry messages by electrical impulse from the brain to the muscles--are

dependent on magnesium for the ability to conduct these minute electrical

messages

properly. Now we are learning that magnesium is equally important to the

central nervous system (spinal cord), and to the brain itself. Add to this the

essentiality of the same mineral for hard healthy bones and teeth and for the

functioning of many of our enzyme systems, and we believe it becomes perfectly

clear that a person would have to be a fool to take any chance on not getting

enough magnesium for even a single day.

 

Also on this website

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Links to over 300 articles discussing magnesium and magnesium deficiency.

To go directly to a specific category, click on an item in the list below.

Some of the conditions magnesium may be useful in treating or preventing

are:

* _Aging_ (http://www.mgwater.com/lista.shtml#aging)

* _Aggressive Behavior_

(http://www.mgwater.com/lista.shtml#aggressive)

* _Alcoholism_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#alcoholism)

* _Amytrophic Lateral Sclerosis_

(http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#als)

* _Alzheimer's Disease_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#alzheimer)

 

* _Arrhythmia_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#arr)

* _Asthma_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#asthma)

* _Attention Deficit Disorder_

(http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#add)

* _Autism_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#autism)

* _Cancer_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#cancer)

* _Cerebral Palsy_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#cp)

* _Cerebrovascular_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#cerebro)

* _Chemical Sensitivity_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#chem)

* _Chronic Fatigue_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listb.shtml#cf)

* _Cluster Headaches_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#cluster)

* _Cocaine-related Stroke_

(http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#cocaine)

* _Constipation_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#const)

* _Cramps_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#cramps)

* _Diabetes_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#diabetes)

* _Fluoride Toxicity_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#fluoride)

* _Head Injuries, Central Nervous System Injuries_

(http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#head)

* _Heart Disease. Heart Attack, Atherosclerosis, Cardiovascular

Disease, etc._ (http://www.mgwater.com/listc.shtml#heart)

* _HIV, AIDS_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#hiv)

* _Hypertension_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#hyper)

* _Kidney Stones_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#kidney)

* _Magnesium Deficiency_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#mgdef)

* _Menopause_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#meno)

* _Migraine Headache_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#migraine)

* _Mitral Valve Prolapse_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#mitral)

 

* _Multiple Sclerosis_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#ms)

* _Nystagmus_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#ny)

* _Osteoporosis_ (http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#osteo)

* _Peripheral vascular disease_

(http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#pvd)

* _Pregnancy-related problems, Eclampsia_

(http://www.mgwater.com/listd.shtml#pregnancy)

* _Premenstrual Syndrome, PMS_

(http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#pms)

* _Psychiatric Disorders_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#psych)

* _Repetitive Strain Injury_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#rep)

 

* _Rheumatoid Arthritis_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#ra)

* _Sickle Cell Disease_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#sickle)

* _SIDS_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#sids)

* _Sports-related problems_

(http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#sports)

* _Stress_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#stress)

* _Stuttering_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#stutter)

* _Tetanus_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#tetanus)

* _Tinnitis, Sound Sensitivity_

(http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#tinnitis)

* _TMJ_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#tmj)

* _Toxic Shock_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#ts)

* _Violence_ (http://www.mgwater.com/liste.shtml#violence)

Articles are listed under one heading only.

Many of them cover more than one subject.

Use the search to find additional articles on your subject.

 

Medical Journal Articles

_Dr. Mildred Seelig_ (http://www.mgwater.com/seelig.shtml)

_Dr. Jean Durlach_ (http://www.mgwater.com/durlach.shtml)

_Dr. Michael Shechter_ (http://www.mgwater.com/shechter.shtml)

_Dr. William J. Rowe_ (http://www.femsinspace.com/)

(Dr. Rowe has linked the cardiovascular complications of space flight with

magnesium deficits)

 

John Libbey Eurotext

_Magnesium Research

Archives, 2003-Present_

(http://www.john-libbey-eurotext.fr/fr/revues/bio_rech/mrh/archives.md?type=text\

..html)

 

 

 

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