“The blood magnesium level in patients with tremor is not particularly low”
“Fatigue shows a big difference… Eye twitching, fatigue accumulation is high”
Eye twitching is more likely to be caused by fatigue than magnesium deficiency, a study found. Getty Images Bank
When the eye area trembles, many people think of magnesium deficiency first.
However, a study in Korea showed that the actual effect of magnesium supplementation was not very noticeable when eye tremor symptoms occurred.
Eye twitching is more likely due to fatigue build-up than magnesium deficiency.
According to the Korea Food Communication Forum (KOFRUM) on the 24th, a research team from the Department of Neurology at Bundang Jesaeng Hospital revealed the results of this study in a paper titled ‘Correlation between hypomagnesemia in blood and the occurrence of benign ophthalmologic pulsation’.
The research team conducted a study on 72 patients aged 20 to 60 who had visited the neurology department of this hospital for the treatment of ocular tremor for the past 5 years (March 2015 to March 2020) and 197 people from the general group without ocular tremor. Differences in blood magnesium levels were analyzed.
As a result, the blood magnesium concentration of the group with ocular tremor was 2.1 mg/dL, which was not significantly different from the group without ocular tremor (2.2 mg/dL).
Regarding fatigue, there was no difference between the two groups. In the group with eye tremor, 84.9% responded that they felt fatigue, and the rate of complaints of fatigue was higher than the group without eye tremor (69.9%).
If there is a slight tremor around the eyes continuously, it is called a benign Yungeun Ahn wave. Most often it occurs in young and healthy people and is also called ‘the disease of medical students’. It was found that eye tremor symptoms are relatively frequent for medical students, and the symptoms become more frequent when studying intensively, such as before an exam.
It is a temporary symptom that usually goes away on its own within a few days, but in some cases it may persist for more than a few months intermittently. It is common for the lower part of one eye to tremble, but sometimes the eye muscles or the area around the lips may tremble. The main causes are fatigue, lack of sleep, stress, excessive caffeine intake, and smoking.
In the paper, the research team said, “In Korea, hypomagnesemia is known to be highly related to eye tremors, and many patients seek magnesium first when symptoms appear.
Hypomagnesemia may cause nerve over-excitation, but there are no reliable studies showing that magnesium supplementation suppresses tremor symptoms.
The results of this study were introduced in the latest issue of the Journal of the Korean Society for Clinical Health Promotion.
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