Dietary magnesium associated with reduced risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-12/bc-dma120516.php

Public Release: 7-Dec-2016
Dietary magnesium associated with reduced risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes
BioMed Central

A diet rich in magnesium may reduce the risk of diseases including coronary heart disease, stroke and type-2 diabetes according to a new meta-analysis published in the open access journal BMC Medicine. This analysis of the evidence on dietary magnesium and health outcomes is the largest to date, involving data from more than one million people across nine countries.

The researchers, from Zhejiang University and Zhengzhou University in China, found that people in the highest category of dietary magnesium consumption had a 10% lower risk of coronary heart disease, 12% lower risk of stroke and a 26% lower risk of type-2 diabetes compared to those in the lowest category. Their results also indicate that an extra 100mg per day of dietary magnesium could also reduce risk of stroke by 7% and type-2 diabetes by 19%.

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This meta-analysis involves observational studies meaning that it is not possible to rule out the effect of other biological or lifestyle factors influencing the results. It is also not possible to determine if magnesium is directly responsible for reducing disease risk. However, the large size of this analysis provides robust data that were stable when adjusting for gender and study location. The authors state that their findings reinforce the notion that increased consumption of magnesium rich foods could be beneficial for overall health.