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O n behalf of Blaine Company, Inc, I would like to respond to the article, "Hypermagnesemia: Elderly Over-the-counter Drug Users at Risk"
Alex M. Blaine
President, Blaine Company Pharmaceuticals Erlanger, Ky
Arch Fam Med. 1996;5(6):323-324.
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| Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings. |
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On behalf of Blaine Company, Inc, I would like to respond to the article, "Hypermagnesemia: Elderly Over-the-counter Drug Users at Risk" by Fung et al1 in the ARCHIVES.
The authors used the work of Whang and Ryder2 in an incomplete and misleading way. Whang and Ryder reported, "Serum magnesium abnormalities were identified in 546 of the 1033 specimens (hypomagnesemia [<0.74mmol/L], 487; hypermagnesemia [>0.99mmol/L], 59."
Fung et al fail to include the data in parentheses, which state that 89% of the 546 "abnormal levels" are hypomagnesemic and only 11% are hypermagnesemic. I think that deleting data from a report to support one's point of view is inappropriate to say the least.
Fung et al report on a patient who consumed bottles of antacid (who had been admitted and discharged the previous month for the same condition): "in her second comatose day... a routine laboratory screen that had been ordered earlier in the day by a medical resident revealed a serum magnesium level of 6.65 mmol/L (16.2 mg/dL)...."
According to Webster's
. . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]
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