Tuesday July 16, 2013 (foodconsumer.org) -- A new study in Journal of the American Heart Association suggests that eating foods high in magnesium or taking magnesium supplements may help prevent fatal coronary heart disease or coronary artery disease.

Dr. Stephanie E. Chiuve, ScD from Department of Medicine Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts and colleagues conducted the study and found the inverse association between dietary intake of magnesium and risk of fatal coronary heart disease among women.

Magnesium has already been associated with lower risk of sudden cardiac death probably due to its antiarrhythmic properties. Physiologically, magnesium is known to affect endothelial function, inflammation, blood pressure, and diabetes mellitus, according to the background information of the study report.

For the study, researchers prospectively examined the link between dietary and serum magnesium and the risk of coronary heart disease among 86,323 women who were free of heart disease and enrolled in the Nurses' Health Study.  During a follow-up of 28 years, 3,614 cases of coronary heart disease were identified.

The researchers compared 458 cases of incident coronary heart disease with the same number of matched controls and found serum magnesium levels above 2.0 mg/dL were correlated with 33% lower risk of coronary heart disease among the female subjects.

They also found the participants with higher magnesium intake were not at reduced risk of total coronary heart disease or non-fatal coronary heart disease whereas those in the highest quintile of dietary intake of magnesium was 39% less likely to suffer fatal coronary heart disease, compared with those in the lowest quintile.  This association, the authors say, seemed to be mediated partially by hypertension.

The researchers concluded "Dietary magnesium intake was inversely associated with fatal CHD, which may be mediated in part by hypertension." (reporting by David Liu, PHD)