Rob (Kentucky) on 09/12/2024

BY ALEXANDER WOLF, NEW YORK 1936

Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1039000/?page=1

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

1. The normal range of magnesium is 2*9 to 4 0 mgm. per 100 c.cm. Of whole blood with an average value of 3861 mgm.

2. In 100 epileptics the blood magnesium ranged from 2-67 to 4-80 mgm., with an average value of 3-47 mgm.

3. Thirty-three (58 per cent.) out of 57 cooperative epileptics were helped by small, daily, non-dehydrating doses of Epsom salt.

4. In a control group of 35 patients taking mineral oil and 15 unco-operative patients taking Epsom salt irregularly, only six patients (12 percent.) showed slight improvement.

5. There was no correlation between degree of improvement and quantity of Epsom salt administered, blood magnesium level, colour or age, except in the psychoses with cerebral arteriosclerosis, in which ages, necessarily advanced, ranged from 60 to 73.

6. In 33 improved cases, six diagnostic groups showed the following percentage improvement:-

Psychosis with cerebral arteriosclerosis .. 76-6 per cent.

Dementia praecox ..... ………………… 720

General paresis ...... …………………...60'0

Epilepsy without psychosis ... …………. 590

Epilepsy with mental deficiency ... ……..490

Psychosis with epilepsy .... …………… 33-8

7. Kidney disease was not present in the patients who responded to treatment; and hypermagnessemia was never sufficient to produce drowsiness or coma.

8. Three patients showed lower than average blood magnesium during convulsions, but reacted poorly to magnesium therapy.

9. Magnesium in small daily dosage is effective in some epileptics neither by filling an elemental deficiency nor by dehydration.