Magnesium Health Watch

From Shop.com: Magonate is a liquid magnesium supplement that can be used by children and adults to supplement or replace magnesium. It may be used for general supplementation and athletic use to help maintain normal dietary levels of magnesium that are depleted through exercising and every day tasks.

Magonate is a great source of magnesium and helpful in replacing the depleted vitamins we lose throughout the day. It is in a liquid form and easy to take when you’re on the go.

Magonate Magnesium Supplement Dietary Supplement 12 ounces

Do you ever wake up in the middle of the night with leg cramps?  There are many remedies for this irritating and painful condition, where your leg or foot will flex without your intending.

Studies have shown that in addition to Vitamin E, other mineral therapies such as magnesium may reduce leg cramping, by addressing the all-too-common magnesium deficiency.

Here’s more detail:

“Low levels of certain minerals known as electrolytes—magnesium, potassium, calcium and sodium—have long been linked to leg cramps. (Marathon runners sweating out the miles are particularly prone to this variety.) Certain drugs, such as diuretics (water pills) for the heart and for high blood pressure, have also been cited as a cause of leg cramps. Dialysis patients, who have their blood filtered by a machine because their kidneys don’t work properly, often complain of leg cramps. And pregnancy, it seems, is also a factor”

Prevention’s Healing with Vitamins Leg Cramps.

This site is a great resource for information on nutrition and wellness.  It includes ‘fact sheets’ on topics, providing basic information on things like minerals.  For example, the magnesium fact sheet includes symptoms of deficiency, levels of toxicity, sources, recommended daily allowance and its physiological functions.

“Magnesium has roles in energy metabolism, muscle contraction, and nerve impulse transmission, and bone mineralization. It is a required cofactor for an estimated 300 enzymes. Among the reactions catalyzed by these enzymes are fatty acid synthesis, protein synthesis, and glucose metabolism. Magnesium status is important for regulation of calcium balance through parathyroid hormone-mediated reactions. Secretion of parathyroid hormone and end-organ responsiveness to the hormone are dependent on availability of the mineral.

As a positively charged divalent cation, magnesium acts as a calcium antagonist at the cell membrane level which is necessary to maintain normal electrical potentials and to coordinate muscle contraction-relaxation responses. In muscle, increased intracellular calcium concentration triggers contraction while increased intracellular magnesium concentration counteracts this effect resulting in relaxation. Magnesium is also involved in metabolism of ATP which enables release of energy stored in the high-energy phosphate ester bond. It is also a potent vasodilator. Magnesium and calcium coordinate the constriction/relaxation of capillary blood vessels which contributes to regulation of blood pressure.”

Nutrition Fact Sheet: Magnesium, Nutrition, Feinberg School of Medicine.

There’s good news regarding the use of minerals in treating insomnia.  Studies have found that calcium helps produce melatonin, which causes sleep. One symptom of magnesium deficiency is chronic insomnia.  This condition was shown to be relieved with normal magnesium levels.  Keep in mind that balancing your calcium and magnesium levels is essential as one can deplete the other. (more…)

Elizabeth Walling published a detailed article on the connections between magnesium deficiency and ADD/ADHD, a condition easily corrected through dietary means.  Check the recommended daily allowance of magnesium based on the age of your child.  Also, seek out organic products which tend to be naturally higher in magensium. (more…)