13. THE PROSTATE
In the December, 1963, issue of Prevention, as part of a series of articles on
the prostate, we wrote a chapter on magnesium and prostate
trouble, part of which we will reprint here as follows.
There is a remarkable book published in French, called
Êquilibre Minéral
et Santé (Mineral Equilibrium and Health), by Dr.
Joseph Favier (Librairie le
François, Paris), and . . . the title indicates that it
deals with the mineral magnesium . . . the miracle mineral. The
book shows how valuable magnesium as a medicament is for many
diseases, but its chapter on magnesium's effect on the prostate
should be discussed. Unfortunately for those who would like to
read it, it is out of print.
Dr. Favier gives a Dr. Stora
credit for being the first to discover magnesium chloride as an
effective agent in treating urinary troubles of prostate origin.
He informed the Medical Academy of
France of it, on March 18, 1930. Eight days later, Dr. Pierre
Delbet submitted a report showing the same results with magnesium
chloride.
When Dr. Stora spoke about his results to Favier, the author
of the book we are discussing, Favier began to make inquiries
among his physician friends ... He found that they were all
taking magnesium chloride. To his surprise he found that four out
of five of them had been disturbed by difficulties in urinating,
especially at night. And all of them, after taking the magnesium
tablets, found that their nocturnal urinating troubles diminished
or disappeared.
Another doctor--Chevassu--gave
him other interesting data about 12 prostatic cases whom he
treated with magnesium tablets. Ten of them were cured. One
disappeared, and he does not know what the result was with him.
The one that was not cured was left with nothing more than
nightly urinations. The interesting thing is that the general
physical condition of all these patients improved. Evidently,
there is something about magnesium that is healthful for the
body.
Dr. Chevassu speaks of his Case No. 4, a 77-year-old prostatic
patient who suffered a crisis of complete retention of urine. He
had to be probed in order to urinate. His prostate was very much
enlarged. Probes were carried on three times a day up to November
24, and hot clysters (enemas) were administered. The first
spontaneous urination took place on November 25; the probes were
cut off on December 7. On December 10, the patient urinated five
times a night and he had a big residue.
The magnesium treatment started on December 14, the dosage
being four tablets (2 g. 40), and went on until February 21,
1930. The nightly urinations fell from five to three, and the
residue dropped to 20 grams.
The patient, having recovered his strength and feeling very
well, believing he was cured, discontinued the treatment. The
frequency of urinations increased, and three days later, on
February 24, the residue had gone up to 126 grams. The magnesium
treatment was resumed, the frequency of urinations curtailed, and
on March 21, the patient informed the doctor that he urinates
only two to three times a night.
Regarding patient 13, who had been a case of complete
retention of urine: he was sent to the hospital in order to have
an operation of the prostate performed; that is, to have his
prostate removed. But Dr. Chevassu felt that the operation in his
case would be too dangerous. He was therefore given the magnesium
chloride tablets. Spontaneous urination occurred, and the patient
left the hospital without the operation. From then on he had no
difficulty or pain with his urinations. Thereafter the patient
used to come to the hospital regularly merely as a friendly
visitor to show his gratitude to the doctor. He was, of course,
taking magnesium tablets after he left the hospital.
Dr. Favier ends the chapter by saying that among the men who
have been taking magnesium chloride tablets for many years, none
to his knowledge has suffered from prostatic trouble.
In connection with some of these cases and their cure, Dr.
Pierre Delbet in Academy of
Medicine (Paris), session of March 25, 1930, says, in regard
to how magnesium acts on the body:
"As magnesium adds to the contractibility of smooth muscle
fibers, one may wonder if the treatment doesn't act uniquely on
the bladder, inasmuch as there isn't any parallel between
reduction in size of the adenoma [a tumor of glandular origin]
and functional improvement. But if, in certain cases, this
improvement is considerable, when reduction in size is slight,
which is favorable to the hypothesis, in other cases, it's
quite the contrary, the reduction is quite more marked than
functional improvement.
"In an earlier communication, M. Bretau and I have shown
that age is accompanied by a
reduction in magnesium in the most active organs and that the
absorption of halogenated salts permits a struggle against
certain manifestations of senility.
"Hypertrophy of the prostate is a complaint of waning life
and perhaps the one which strikes most terribly. The facts
communicated by M. Stora, which I have just reported and which
belong to M. Chevassu, show that it is one illness which can be
modified by halogenated magnesium salts.
"The preceding observations show that halogenated magnesium
salts sometimes have an extraordinary action in very advanced
cases. The sick man in observation XIII, who had complete
retention, comes to see me regularly at Cochin to express his
gratitude. He came right at the time of my retirement, that is
to say during 16 months. He continued to take the treatment and
urinated without difficulty.
"Since that time, a number of prostate sufferers, whom I
don't know, have expressed their gratitude to me for the
services that delbiase [a
magnesium compound] rendered them.
"Its mode of action is completely obscure to me. What is
striking is that the effects stop from the moment that the
treatment is stopped. The subject of observation IV is an
example. His nocturnal urinations were reduced to three and the
residue, which had been considerable, fell to 20 grams. He
stopped the treatment and in three days, the frequency of his
urinations increased and the residue rose to 125 grams.
"One of my former pupils, a distinguished surgeon, has
communicated his own observation to me. It appears to be very
interesting. He had nocturnal urinations whose frequency
increases all the time. He put himself on the delbiase regimen.
His urination became less frequent. "My life," he said, "was
completely untroubled. I could only complain that drinks were a
little more frequent and a little more demanding than I should
have liked." At the beginning of the war, he was mobilized and
sent to be a surgeon at the front where he couldn't get any
delbiase. His urinations became more frequent and assumed
painful proportions. His general health was affected. Two and a
half months after the treatment was stopped, it was noted that
he had a residue of 220 grams.
"In sum, the effect of halogenated salts of magnesium isn't
lasting. They improve or even suppress functional difficulties;
they don't heal the lesions. They cause them to retrocede in a
certain number of cases, but they don't cure them. As soon as
the treatment is stopped, the development begins anew. Doesn't
that prove in a peremptory manner that an insufficiency of
magnesium in the organism is the cause, or at least one of the
causes, of these lesions?'
Senility
Here are some of Delbet's ideas on senility. He says that all
organs and tissues do not age at the same speed. The muscular
system generally lasts the shortest period, the nervous system
the longest. "The role of magnesium in organic synthesis leads
one to think that it must diminish with age. Weiske's work shows
that magnesium is less abundant in the bones of old rabbits than
it is in those of young ones." In the human testicles a decline
in magnesium was demonstrated as a person ages, but in old age
calcium is more abundant than magnesium-three times more
abundant. But here is something extremely interesting. As Dr.
Delbet puts it, calcium is considered as a "framework" mineral,
but magnesium is an "action" mineral. Calcium is static,
magnesium is dynamic.
He says, "Added calcium and reduced magnesium are the
characteristics of the senile testicle. In the brain and in the
testicle, the relationship with age of are the same degree, but
it appears certain to us that at the time that life is waning,
magnesium diminishes while calcium rises. Now, everything that is
known about the chemical magnesium, about its action in the
synthesis of chlorophyll, justifies one in thinking that its
reduction plays a role in senility, or at least
in certain phenomena of senility.
Now, if magnesium in the body becomes less abundant as we grow
old, and since medical researchers prove that deficiencies of
magnesium lead to many diseases, isn't it common sense to take
magnesium as a food supplement on a permanent basis?
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