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A fresh look at past research concludes that people who eat foods rich in magnesium have fewer strokes – a finding that supports current diet guidelines.
But because the research focused on magnesium in food, the authors stopped short of recommending daily magnesium supplements.
What the results suggest is that people should eat a healthy diet with "magnesium-rich foods such as green leafy vegetables, nuts, beans and whole grains," said lead author Dr Susanna Larsson, from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden.
Dr Larsson and her colleagues searched databases spanning the last 45 years to find studies that tracked magnesium consumption and stroke rates.
More magnesium, smaller stroke risk
In seven studies published in the past 14 years, about 250,000 people in the US, Europe and Asia were followed for an average of 11.5 years. About 6,500 of them, or 3%, had a stroke during follow-up.
For every extra 100 mg of magnesium consumed per day, the risk of an ischaemic stroke fell by 9%.
The median magnesium intake for US men and women included in the analysis was 242 mg/day. The US recommends men and women over age 31 eat 420 and 320 mg/day of magnesium, respectively.
Most of the studies allowed the researchers to rule out other factors, such as family history, from the results, but Dr Larsson told Reuters Health in an email that she cannot say whether other diet features partially or entirely explain the finding.
Diet is rich in fruit, vegetables and grains
And because the studies included in the analysis, published online in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, were all observational, they can't prove causality.
Dr Larry Goldstein, director of the stroke centre at the Duke University Medical Centre in Durham, North Carolina, commented to Reuters Health that although the findings from reviews like Dr Larsson's are limited, they are consistent with what's typically recommended.
"It's a diet that's rich in fruits, vegetables and grains," said Dr Goldstein. "Those are things that have low sodium, high potassium and high magnesium."
"It's again the diet per se, not any one individual component of the diet," Dr Goldstein said.
(Andrew M. Seaman, Reuters Health, January 2012)
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