Magnesium and muscle performance in older persons: the InCHIANTI study

Abstract

Background:The role of magnesium in maintaining muscle integrity and function in older adults is largely unknown. Objective: We aimed to investigate the relation between serum magnesium concentrations and muscle performance in older subjects. Design: Data are from the baseline examination conducted between September 1998 and March 2000 of the InCHIANTI (aging in the Chianti area) study, a prospective epidemiologic survey of risk factors for late-life disability. From among 1453 randomly selected community residents completing a home interview, 1138 men (46%) and women (aged 66.7 Ȁ 15.2 y; x Ȁ SD) with complete data on muscle performance and serum magnesium who were not severely cognitively compromised and had no evidence of kidney disease or hypercalcemia were included in the analysis. Muscle performance was evaluated by grip strength, lower-leg muscle power, knee extension torque, and ankle extension isometric strength and was normalized for age and body mass index (BMI) within each sex. Results: After adjustment for age, sex, BMI, laboratory variables, presence of chronic diseases, muscle area, muscle density, and physical activity level, serum magnesium concentrations were significantly associated with indexes of muscle performance, including grip strength (␤ ҃ 2.0 Ȁ 0.5, P ҃ 0.0002), lower-leg muscle power (␤ ҃ 8.8 Ȁ 2.7, P ҃ 0.001), knee extension torque (␤ ҃ 31.2 Ȁ 7.9, P 0.0001), and ankle extension strength (␤ ҃ 3.8 Ȁ 0.5, P 0.0001). Conclusions:The serum magnesium concentration is an independent correlate of muscle performance in older persons. Whether magnesium supplementation improves muscle function remains to be shown.Am J Clin Nutr 2006;84:419 -26.

Micronutrient intake in elderly living in nursing homes

“…Similarly, a cross-sectional study of more than 1,000 residents in the elderly community identified that the serum concentration of serum magnesium was significantly associated with improvement rates of muscle strength (36). In addition, another study aimed to verify the association between ingestion of micronutrients and muscle strength showed that nutrients with selenium, betacarotene and vitamin C were positively associated with handgrip strength (37).…”

Higher circulating levels of uric acid are prospectively associated with better muscle function in older persons

“…Handgrip isometric strength, in kilograms, was used as a measure of upper extremity muscle strength (Lauretani et al 2003;Semba et al 2007;Dominguez et al 2006;Abbatecola et al 2005) We previously demonstrated that the standardized protocol used in the InCHIANTI study provides reliable measures of strength (Bandinelli et al 1999) and that knee extension torque and handgrip are strongly correlated with strength of other muscle groups, respectively, of the lower and upper extremities (Lauretani et al 2003).…”

Nutritional influences on age-related skeletal muscle loss

“…Low serum magnesium has been associated with lower muscle strength, but the role of magnesium has so far only been found to be positively related to muscle mass in two studies (15,249,256) . In a 2·6-year follow-up study, magnesium was a positive predictor of change in appendicular lean mass, as was iron, phosphorus and zinc, indicating a role for minerals in conservation of lean mass, i.e.…”