Hypermagnesemia?

[eve789]

Hi all,

I received an abnormally high (3.0 mg/DL) level of magnesium on a blood test with my PCP. Reference range is 1.5-2.5 mg/DL. I do not take magnesium supplements. I'd been concerned I was deficient. My doctor told me not to take supplements.

An additional test, which measures magnesium inside RBCs, and that I took with an alternative health practitioner, showed that I was deficient.

Now, I presume the test with my PCP measured serum levels, while the test by my alternative doctor measured cell levels. Anyone have any idea what could explain high serum concentrations of magnesium, but low intracellular concentrations?

 

[rlc]

Hi eve 789, the mechanism for storage of magnesium in serum and cells is different, it is common for cell levels to be low and serum levels normal, this is because the body does everything it can to maintain normal serum levels at the expense of cell levels and will deplete cell levels to do this, only about one percent of magnesium is in the serum the rest is in the cells, however something is obviously causing problems with your serum magnesium levels, there are other diseases that can cause serum levels to go up, this doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to much magnesium in your body it is just being moved in to larger amounts to the serum, , but this may turn out to be a very useful clue for you, high serum magnesium is not a finding normally associated with ME, it is however found in other conditions that have very similar symptom patterns to ME and some further investigations may find what is causing your health problems, it is not a test result to be ignored!
This site shows some of the causes of high serum Magnesium, see http://labtestsonline.org/understanding/analytes/magnesium/tab/test The diseases that cause high serum Magnesium include some of the diseases that cause very similar symptoms to ME, and if you haven’t had these diseases ruled out they have to be, some of these diseases are also ones that most doctors know very little about diagnosing or use information that is out of date and therefore miss the diagnosis.
The disease that can cause high magnesium and symptoms similar to ME are
Addison’s diseases (Adrenal insufficiency) the symptoms of Addison’s disease are described here http://www.localhealth.com/article/addisons-disease/symptoms recurrent flu like symptoms are found in some patients see http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1096911-clinical
Most doctors believe that the initial test for it is morning cortisol, and if Cortisol is in normal range then the patient doesn’t have it, this is not true! Patients can still be within normal range and have Addison’s disease, how to properly diagnose Adrenal insufficiency is explained here http://suite101.com/article/adrenalinsufficiency-a1543 morning cortisol and serum ACTH and aldosterone must be measured and an ACTH stimulation test often has to be done as well.
Hyperparathyroidism symptoms of hyperparathyroidism are here http://www.parathyroid.com/parathyroid-symptoms.htm
Hyperparathyroidism is often overlooked and the diagnosis can be missed because most doctors believe that Calcium and PTH must both be high this is not true PTH can still be in the normal range see http://www.parathyroid.com/diagnosis.htm
Hypothyroidism symptoms are explained here http://thyroid.about.com/cs/basics_starthere/a/symptoms.htm
It has been discovered that the reference range for TSH the main test for hypothyroidism is wrong but labs haven’t changed it, it should be as low as 2.5 but most labs say it is above 5 this leads to lots of people having the diagnosis missed information on this and how to treat the thyroid properly when TSH is between 2.5 and 5 can be found in this article http://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/11/02/unveiling-mysteries-thyroid more about TSH referance range being wrong can be found here http://thyroid.about.com/od/gettestedanddiagnosed/a/tshtestwars.htm other tests can be needed to diagnose hypothyroidism such as T4 and T3 they are explained here http://thyroid.about.com/od/gettestedanddiagnosed/a/bloodtests.htm
If you haven’t already you should have your kidney function tested and be tested for Diabetes.
There is another site which is down for maintenance at the moment that may have some more suggestions for diseases that cause high serum magnesium, when it comes back online I will let you know.
High serum magnesium should lead to an investigation of these diseases, it’s in the text books that this is what should happen, if your doctor has done nothing about it; I suggest printing out the information and getting them to run the tests, if they still won’t you may need to get another doctor.
Hope this helps
All the best