Why dont the Docs Weigh In?

I am now 18 months post ablation. Doing well. Still have some episodes but they subside quickly. I have religiously taken advice and stick with Low Sod V8 daily (about 24 oz) and magnesium powder to tolerance.

This protocol has reduced my ectopics, flutter, etc. Without a doubt it helps.

With all of the research and everyone's experiences and reporting here, several questions remain for me

#1 If mag wasting and low levels of mag and pot can cause afib, why do the doctors not prescribe the two? My cardio only says be very very careful with supplements (as a warning)
#2 If mag and potassium can subdue afib why are there not IV offerings whether clinics or docs? IV infusion would have to be much quicker and more efficient

Why are these not part of the medical treatment for afib?

Aside from more lucrative alternatives, Mg and K+ make some patients worse. Are the studies there to show that Mg works?

" Are the studies there to show that Mg works?" What about session 61? Are we all liars, and what motive would we have had for telling such elaborate lies anyway? How was the telling of such false stories co-ordinated, especially between people not personally aquainted? None of us knew one another before posting here. Does anyone here, no matter how impaired, really think all of us got together to write all these false stories about having had afib and got rid of it again just to deceive the readers of this forum? What about all the List posts made since session 61 closed? Are all those people also liars? Or are we all co-conspirators?

End of rant here.

PeggyM

Peggy:

When was the last contact made with Fran Ross? Her story was the most incredulous. Almost 20 years in AFIB most of the time, then reversed out of it.

What "List Posts made since session 61 closed" are you talking about the additions made later on the their original stories?

Also these stories aren't really counted for much, even on here, as the high standard set by Shannon, that 8 years of Solid NSR has to be achieved in order for the Strategy to be called truly successfull. If the same standard was set for success of "expert ablation process" than very few Ablationees have achieved this. That is even if the Ablatees noticed their AFIB, since the burning of the nerve endings during Ablation frequently makes the Palpitations less noticable.

tsco - I'm very pleased that you continue to do well and I certainly wish you NSR forever.

It's unfortunate that most doctors, including heart specialists aren't typically conversant with the importance of nutritional requirements to keep all cells optimally functional...not just heart cells. However, they aren't educated to go back to basics requirements to maintain overall functional health without relying on drugs or procedures. Not their fault; it's the medical system that eliminated that 'holistic' thinking about 50 years ago. Fortunately, in past 25 years or so, many have gone back to basics and are once again looking at fundamental nutrition and interferences thereof to restore health in their patients.

You asked about IV magnesium and potassium.... That's actually done by a few forward thinking doctors. Not sure if there is a study reference but it's been known for years that during cardiac surgery, if a patient goes into arrhythmia during the procedure, an IV of magnesium (I think it's sulfate) corrects the problem. Neurosurgeon, Russell L. Blaylock, MD, has reported in his newsletters that during his surgeries he just automatically ordered the magnesium IVs as a preventive measure which helped the patient and saved time during the procedure... (not having to stop and set up for the IV magnesium if arrhythmia occurred.) He was making the point there that conventional medicine was far behind the knowledge about using magnesium as a preventive.

As for the age-old question of why cardiologists and EPs don't get into electrolyte balances... they do to a certain extent during the procedure...at least for potassium, as my labs shows potassium was checked on Ablation #3 this past April.

When the majority of doctors hear the mention of the word "supplements"... it's my experience that they do two things, they go on alert to consider that you are "one of those" patients and not to take too seriously anything you might say as you are one of the "fringe" people...unless they have advanced education in area of functional medicine or integrative concepts that emphasize nutrition and metabolic testing into their practices.

Keep in mind that there are many contributing factors to interferences of the electrical conduction pathway and ablation only addresses the known potentials or drivers that are detected during the procedure.

Over the 13+ years that I've been reading posts by afibbers and ablated afibbers, I don't recall seeing posts saying they were able to resume their old lifestyle habits and still be free of some recurrent AF.

While optimizing the critical electrolytes (magnesium and potassium) is important and most always useful for afibbers, it's not the only factor. If there are other influences such as silent inflammation that continue to irritate heart cells, that's a big factor.

Addressing the causes of silent inflammation and that irritation includes assessing lifestyle and environmental factors. Lifestyle includes eating fast food with too many chemicals, flavor enhancers and salt or for some, drinking alcohol - known to kill heart cells (and brain cells) and for others, reactivity to grains, or wheat or gluten. Heavy exercising or endurance exercise that creates free radicals and produces oxidative stress damage and inflammation to heart cells -- former triggers -- remain high on the list of potential causes for breakthrough AF. That also continues fibrosis formation as does magnesium deficiency in that, without magnesium, the enzymes that break down fibrotic tissue aren't able to function optimally, if at all.

The fibrosis factor is the most significant influence for recurrent afib because it begins with just a few cells and expands from there. In the initial stages of fibrosis formation, it certainly is not detectable by scans or other devices but most definitely can physically interfere with heart cell electrical conductivity. An ablation doesn't exempt one from developing fibrosis.

The many posts on cardiac fibrosis and the two extensive Conference Room Sessions... 24 and 75 certainly should be studied by every afibber and especially those who have had ablations so it's understood that fibrosis is an ongoing, natural protective mechanism that can be prevented, managed and eliminated. It's not just in heart cells, but when it manifests as AFib, it's no longer a silent condition. Other areas of fibrosis don't often give such clear signals as Afib.

Here's to your ongoing good health and peaceful heart!

Jackie

'Doing the science' from the beginning of life on planet earth, then to the science of a single living cell, then to the science of a contractile muscle cell, then to a system of muscle cells such as the atrial myocardium, ultimately one arrives at a level of understanding where AF cure is not only possible, AF cure is inevitable if the correct steps are taken to enhance those elements of one's innate healing system that have failed for lack of required nutrients, and for anti-nutrients (anti-metabolites, toxins) hindering the nutrients.

Thus were the cures in '61' achieved, by full use of nature-given rational objectively, intuition, and power of discernment.

AF is epidemic for reasons of decreased dietary nutrients and increased anti-nutrients, not for increased age of the population per se, although age obviously factors into the body's utilization of nutrients and accumulated anti-nutrients.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/17/2015 03:06PM by Moerk.

Anti Afib - Last we heard from Fran Ross was she was enrolled in Naturopath college. I can't think of anyone better suited - especially with her experience and conquering the Afib and the seizures with dietary protocols...which just gets back to the basics... as we know. It would be wonderful to hear from her again and I keep hoping that she will reappear one day and share her news.

I've started organizing my list of former afibber contacts so I can email to see what's happened to them. It's going to be quite a task and probably many email addresses are now non-functional, but I'll be trying to learn if they are still cured by natural means or not.

Jackie

Anti Fib:

I agree with you, a lot of those posters in Session 61 were only AF free for a few months not years, I have been AF free for 3 to 3 1/2 months, I would not write that I was cured, I still get episodes of AF.

Peggy:

Instead of a rant, which does not help, since you were one of the writers in that 61 session, do you consider yourself AF free since that time?

Liz

Here is a post from 4/27, 2011, one of many where i have described afib frequency thru the years. If anyone is still curious about how often i get afib episodes, a search will turn up many more such posts. I have not exactly kept these things a secret, i do not think.

[www.afibbers.org]


At the time that post was made i was getting afib about once a month, usually when i either lapsed in supplement intake or strayed drastically from paleo diet. Lately i do not get as many afib episodes as that. To date during 2015 there have been 4 episodes altogether, all quickly converted by one or at most 2 ativan tablets, 1 mg each. One or 2 brief episodes at the end of last year or the beginning of this, i misremember which, were the result of taking an antibiotic called levoquin. It has a reputation for causing afib episodes, entirely well deserved.

PeggyM

Peggy:

Thank you for your assessment of your AF episodes, up until today I have had 5 AF episodes, only 1 more than you. I do not consider myself as cured because I am not.

There is a lot more to AF than just our electrolytes, I eat a good diet, lots of veggies (from my garden). good protein, I do all my own cooking, it isn't just mag./pot, that is a big help of course but not the total answer.

I suppose if we could take the amount of Mag. that George takes than perhaps that would hold AF at bay, there is no way I could ever take that amount. Since I eat a lot of fruits and veggies that alone causes loose stools, to take mag along with all my veggies/fruits really sends me to the john.

I understand that Jackie will try to contact some of the posters in Session 61, hopefully that will shed more light.

Liz

LIZ:

Fwiw, it looks like to me that your version of "The Strategy" although not a complete success, may be keeping your AFIB at bay and it would be much worse if you abandoned your abatement efforts.

Tsco

My EP says he cannot comment on the efficacy of supplements because there is no evidence.

Drug companies will fund studies of drugs because they will make money. With supplements no one will pay for the high quality studies needed to produce solid evidence because there is no profit to be made.

Gill

Antifib, i have copied out your question so as to answer it.
"
What "List Posts made since session 61 closed" are you talking about the additions made later on the their original stories?"

Session 61 was compiled by going into the archives, searching on the term "The List", At that time one could search the titles of posts separately from the texts, but that capability has been lost now. Those posts got labeled with the words "The List" in their title lines just so that they could later be retrieved this way, Modernization has removed this simple, easy, efficient method but is unable to restore it..Enough about that. After session 61 happened, i did not stop marking List posts.and these posts that i marked during the period following session 61 are still in the archives like all the other posts that have been made over the years this forum has been in existence. They are no longer accessible to me at least. All i can get from the search function is a list containing all the posts that happened to contain the word "list", and there are so many that i cannot pick out the ones i need. Perhaps some person with up to date computer skills can access them, but that person has not yet appeared. I can make a guess at how many are in there, all marked uselessly with "The List" in the titles, but it is only a guess.

Here goes the guess: probably 50 to 60 new List posts per year since 2011. When i say new List posts, i mean posts from people who are new List members, not updates from people already Listed. There are an awful lot of " medical anomalies" out there.

PeggyM

Liz - True, magnesium and potassium are important electrolytes... and the emphasis should be on their function that serves to help reverse the AF trend for many people. It's misleading to dismiss the importance of magnesium or potassium just by saying... you eat well and still have AF so therefore magnesium isn't important. The science says otherwise.

One very prominent and critically-important role of magnesium is facilitating enzymes that function specifically in the body's natural, protective mechanism of breaking down excess collagen formation called fibrosis.

When fibrosis forms in the area of heart cells, the result is a physical interruption of electrical conduction signals or circuits and palpitations and AF.

Depending on who's quoting, it's reported magnesium is required for a range of 300 to 350 or more enzymatic reactions in the human body. The fibrosis function is just one enzyme task. If other priorities are more essential, then it's foreseeable that not enough would be shuttled to the enzyme that manages cardiac fibrosis.

With age, fibrosis formation is common. It's also accelerated where there are stimulators of fibrosis such as high oxygen and intake from heavy endurance exercise and the resultant oxidative damage or fibrosis (scarring) in the area of the pulmonary veins which is a typical site of initial arrhythmia potentials or drivers along with scarring in other areas in the heart as well. Inflammation as a result of oxidative stress can result in fibrosis as a protective response. Magnesium deficiency has been identified as a known cause of cardiac fibrosis formation and as mentioned in the previous response, it's acknowledged by studies and discussed thoroughly in CR 24 and 75.

So, it's very important to continue to emphasize the importance of optimizing intracellular stores of magnesium for just these few factors related to AF. There are others...obviously... at least another 299 more reasons to support essential enzymatic reactions to maintain overall health and longevity.

Jackie

Gill ,

A licensed physician saying "there is no evidence" of supplement efficacy is an obvious lie to avoid censure, by licensing powers or by colleagues.

Jackie:

You said "Liz - True, magnesium and potassium are important electrolytes... and the emphasis should be on their function that serves to help reverse the AF trend for many people. It's misleading to dismiss the importance of magnesium or potassium just by saying... you eat well and still have AF so therefore magnesium isn't important. The science says otherwise.

I didn't say Mag. isn't important, you are putting words in my mouth, I said Mag/pot isn't the whole story to AF. You, Hans and P.C. all took Mag/Pot yet AF still wasn't whipped, ablations were done. You are putting the importance of mag. on supplements, food is always a better way, if one cannot get enough, then of course take supplements. I am also trying a mag. spray every few days.

Why can't I get a lot of mag. from foods, I eat a lot of mag. rich foods, I have found I am having problems with taking mag. supplements, they are giving me cramps (I have been taking Mag. gly.) which has been the recommended supplement to take. My daughter goes to a Holistic doctor in Florida, she asked him about Mag. supplements, he told her that one can develop an intolerance to Mag. There was a poster on here about a month ago that said mag. supplements gave him an AF episode, I can't find that post, maybe someone remembers it

Liz

Some people just don't go on to develop a highly progressive form of AFIB, and it can go on for 10 or even 20 years with just a handful of paroxysmal episodes a year regardless of what they do, or don't do. While many others ... and what clearly seems a significant majority .... do seem to need a good deal of help from various fronts and methods in order to reverse the gradually, or quickly progressive, tide of increased AFIB frequency and duration.

It's just part of this widely variable tapestry of AFIB manifesting in its many forms and that includes some who absolutely just spontaneous go into remission for even excessively long periods including the rest of their lives after having had both symptomatic and asymptomatic AFIB for various periods of time, confirmed and under treatment and periodic follow up by Cardiologist and EPs ... nearly all of those kind of docs can recount a handful of such cases.

We have seen too on our forum that taking better care of one's diet, stress, exercise and overall health and reducing risk factors and taking heart calming nutrients can all play a role to variable degrees in many of us slowing or abating the manifestation of AFIB for, again, variable periods of times including a relatively modest number whose apparent freedom from AFIB (at least noticeable symptomatic versions, regardless of if there might be some silent episodes as well) at this point has continued long enough for them to pronounce with great conviction that they are permanently 'cured'. And in a fewer number of these modest number of cases, they may be more or less right.

The larger point being, that we have a number of great tools now to address AFIB in a proper sequence as well, and in doing so as we have gradually refined the process as noted above which should cover all the bases in a reasonable time frame for both insuring you get as much out of all the natural protocols as you can, even if and when it becomes wise to throw a top level ablation process in there as well in the midst of your on-going life-long dedication to better health, diet and nutrition going forward.

It's not one thing against another, and there is no failure or lesser achievement in how you achieve constant NSR, and no brownie points or gold stars awarded for methodology used in the end, just that you do whatever it takes you to reach that goal. Some will get lucky and will earn lasting NSR too via carefully following the natural protocols ( although as conference room 61 and so many reports on the forum have noted the wide degree of natural elements that have been associated with improved heart stability for varying periods of time in different people) and many others with need the combined approach.

While everyone prefers, of course, to just turn the thing off as easily and non-invasively as possible, the value in not beating around the bush too long in getting NSR as Job #1 well done, far outweighs any ideologue-like evangelistic devotion to either one approach over the other.

Shannon



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2015 11:54PM by Shannon.

Hi, Liz,

I can certainly empathize with your difficulties with magnesium supplements. I have written here that trying to take more magnesium, either oil on my skin, supplements or epsom salts in a bath have all led at one time or another to an AF episode for me. Just this past week I was intrigued with the article in the most recent AFIB Report about how taking too much magnesium can cause "intestinal hurry," a condition that can be unsymptomatic since it is prior to any signs of going past bowel tolerance. Ironically, in this case, if it is happening to you, you may be creating a magnesium deficiency by taking more magnesium. I've been able to take 400mg./day of magnesium glycerinate with no problems, but I'm not sure at this point that it's the right dose for me. Since my recent second ablation I'm cutting back to half this and will see if the issue of intestinal hurry is a factor. Since this condition can lead to other nutrient deficiencies I think it may be a concern for me. So, as with most everything, finding the right balance seems to be the key. More is not necessarily better.

Concerning your question about why food can't provide enough magnesium, what I have read on the subject repeatedly is that our soil is now depleted of magnesium because of modern farming practices and so it is more or less impossible for most people to get the magnesium needed from food alone. It does seem to be a pretty standard conclusion that, if you have AF, you have a magnesium deficiency at the cellular level. Several contributors here have written about the tests that you can have to determine your cellular level, and I will likely have the RBC test soon. And, of course, supplements may not reach the cellular level. I've also taken ReMag, a liquid that is designed to supplement at the cellular level, but this, too, caused an AF episode. I tried it twice prior to my most recent ablation to be sure that it was ReMag, and after that I wasn't in the mood to risk losing NSR for another experiment.

Rob



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2015 04:49PM by rob50.

So if somebody wants to mine the archives for Peggy's work, go to advance search <[www.afibbers.org] Use search words:
The List
Click the box that says "All Words" and choose "Exact Phrase."
Then go down to the bottom to the box that says "Last 30 days" and choose "All Dates"
Then press "Search"
=ALL&match_threads=0&match_dates=0]
Page back about 5 or so years and start looking for the words
The List
in the Subject line.
Then right click the post of interest and read it and the one Peggy is referring to.

George



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2015 08:55AM by GeorgeN.

RBC mg testing is only useful for assaying whole-body Mg status, but is useless for knowing cardiac muscle cell Mg status,

RBCs are produced in the marrow of bones and can only have the level of Mg that is in the marrow at the time they are formed. RBCs have no means for adding Mg and indeed lose Mg as they age.

Muscle cells, on the other hand, have Mg pumps to drive Mg 'uphill' into the cells, accounting for cardiac muscle cells having about 40 times the Mg level of RBCs.

For comparison, the body's distribution of Mg by percent:
Serum 0.3
RBCs 0.5
Soft tissue 19.3
Muscle 27.0
Bone 52.9



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2015 10:55PM by Moerk.

PeggyM:

So there were posts tagged "The List" since session 61 officially closed in 2007. I see some of those after following Georges instructions. Am I right that this sort of fell by the way-side in the last 3 years, and no more posts are being tagged "The List"? I am wondering if Session 61 should have been left open indefinately, and the requirements to post maybe more stringent like 6 months of NSR.

Secondly was there alot more posters back then? Was the board more active with more users, to get that activity on special sessions on top of the activity on this regular forum?

Anyway thankyou in regards for your efforts in compiling "The List".

"Am I right that this sort of fell by the way-side in the last 3 years, and no more posts are being tagged "The List"? I am wondering if Session 61 should have been left open indefinitely, and the requirements to post maybe more stringent like 6 months of NSR."

"Secondly was there alot more posters back then? Was the board more active with more users, to get that activity on special sessions on top of the activity on this regular forum? "

AF - There were a lot of people trying many different approaches (seems much fewer today). There were also people willing to put together in depth posts which are the starting point of many of the CR sessions. Especially PC (Pat Chambers MD) & Hans. The work compiling session 61 by Peggy was a huge effort. I did some of that & it was based not only on an initial post by a person, but also trying to mine the archives for future posts for more detail and to see what happened. Peggy's efforts in tagging these posts is huge.

An ongoing vehicle to collect and organize success stories is a good idea.

I'm not sure exactly when Peggy started tagging posts. In 2004, she'd not marked many. I read almost all of the prior posts (before she started) to that date as a way to construct my own remission program. Hans also used to create surveys for the Afib Report, and I used the results of those surveys as fodder for my program.

George

Dear Anti,
About a year or so ago [maybe 2 years, time goes by real fast], though i do not remember the date, I tried to follow George's instructions above, but whether thru equipment failure or thru failure of "the nut behind the wheel", I could not bring up anything like what i remembered as The List, and i packed it in about marking List posts. Lately I have gotten some friendly comments about my former activity marking List posts, but at the time i was feeling generally unappreciated, and probably some flying s---storm had just occurred at home, and i quit doing it. I do not feel inclined to resume it now either, but it is not a complicated activity and i think anybody can do it if they feel particularly motivated to do so. Some longtime presence on the bb is probably needed, so as to know a little about a given poster, and whether she/he is a longtime correspondent or a newbie. If i had to pick somebody as particularly suitable, i would nominate George Newman. Of course he may decline this as a very dubious honor.

Another question:
" I am wondering if Session 61 should have been left open indefinately, and the requirements to post maybe more stringent like 6 months of NSR. "

To quote a line from a Lou Rawls song,"if icould i should i woulda..."

Actually I do think i remember agreeing with Hans that 6 months NSR should be a criterion for inclusion in session 61. I do remember that he wanted my posts to specify how long NSR had lasted to date, and they all do.

Another question: "Secondly was there alot more posters back then? Was the board more active with more users, to get that activity on special sessions on top of the activity on this regular forum?"

The board did not seem more active to me "back then". The reason there seemed to you to be a lot of posters, in my opinion, was that i was extracting posts from at least several years worth of posts that had been made at that time..

There do seem to me to be a lot of posters who have arrested progress of their afib by means other than surgery or heart drugs. If these are medical anomalies there are an awful lot of them. If this is a handful then somebody has got very big hands. If we are a bunch of medical freaks there must be an epidemic of freakishness, because there seem to me to be a large lot of this kind of freaks. If this freedom from afib episodes is a coincidence then it is a very reproducible coincidence and a lot of people claim to be experiencing this coincidence.

Way back when i first started marking List posts, i used to count up that year's List posts and post that number to the forum sometime around xmas or new years day. I think i did this for 2-3 years and then quit doing the annual count since nobody but me and said Listmembers seemed interested in that topic. When i was making a count of new Listmembers, there were 50 to 60 each year. New ones, not updates from people already Listed. That is the basis for my earlier estimate that the archives now contain 50 to 60 new List posts per year from the time session 61 ended to the time i stopped marking List posts, in 2013 or 14.

Also there are a lot of List posts remaining in the archives that i did not get to before Hans asked me to stop compiling because session 61 was running out of room. My guess at the time was that there remained as many List posts in the archives that i had not gotten to as there were posts that i had already extracted.

And of course posts have been made since i stopped marking List posts that i would have marked as List posts if i had thought there was any point in so doing. I may have been mistaken about these estimated numbers, then or since, or i may have been correct. Either way there are a lot more "medical anomalies" floating around than the ones we have noted so far. Even if you discount my estimates by half, that is still a lot. At what proportion of the population does an anomaly stop being called anomalous and start being, perhaps, "an unknown proportion of patients"?

PeggyM

Shannon said:

Some people just don't go on to develop a highly progressive form of AFIB, and it can go on for 10 or even 20 years with just a handful of paroxysmal episodes a year regardless of what they do, or don't do. While many others ... and what clearly seems a significant majority .... do seem to need a good deal of help from various fronts and methods in order to reverse the gradually, or quickly progressive, tide of increased AFIB frequency and duration.

If I could have been one of those fortunate enough to have one or two afib events annually for the last 20 years, I would have welcomed that opportunity and never, ever considered going the ablation route. As I've learned with other surgeries, one thing often is put to rest, but then consequences of that surgery manifest into others. I think it's best whenever possible to avoid surgical interventions... especially until all possible causes or etiology of the condition have been fully explored...and that's not always a simple or even possible task.

Peggy's work with The List is one of the most important endeavors we had going back when it was started and I agree with her suggestion to keep it open-ended so new success reports can be added. I'm in the process of contacting afibbers that communicated with me personally to learn their current arrhythmia status. I'll compile that and contribute to whomever is picking up the torch for Peggy to continue with an update of CR 61 and also The List so it can be all in one place and located easily with a search. Nice touch for the new forum format.

As noted by many, what works for one, does not always work for another but having multiple options that are easy and relatively inexpensive makes sense in the initial stages because often it's something with diet and lifestyle that needs to be changed. That's the value of The List and CR 61... lots of anecdotal reports to which new readers can relate... especially those who don't have adequate insurance coverage to seek out specialized medical care.

During discussions such as this one, I am always reminded of one of my friends, a former afibber, from about ten years ago. Someone had posted about the importance of avoiding gluten-containing foods. That was the answer for this afibber and all has been quiet since whereas life previously was the annoying Afib turmoil we all know so well. Had that information not been here and noted, probably an ablation would have been performed... and the underlying cause ... the gluten sensitivity would have been left to continue causing other havoc elsewhere in the body.

Jackie

Magnesium (and other nutrient ) absorption from both foods and supplements depend on healthy portals or gut lumen in the intestinal villi that allow transfer the magnesium/nutrients from the intestine to the blood stream where it can then circulate to cells and be accepted into the cell providing the cells' receptor sites are also healthy and operational.

When intestinal absorption is blocked, the result can be cramping and diarrhea. Same with impaired cellular receptors.. if the Mg can't access inside the cell, it's discarded and will also accumulate in the intestine and cause cramping and diarrhea in the laxation effect.... whereas, if it had accessed the blood stream, it would be dispersed throughout the body and the laxation effect is not an issue. However, certainly, one can have laxation effect just by taking too much magnesium at one time.

Unhealthy lumen portals on the villi are influenced by overgrowth of Candida and sludge from undesirable food intake such as bad fats or even sluggish transit time. Plenty of fiber helps keep everything clean and functional... but the most critical is the abundance of the good bowel bacteria...or friendly flora. Various chemicals from foods, alcohol, and environmental influences such as GMO foods kill good gut bacteria. When there is inadequate good bowel bacteria, a lot goes awry in the transfer of nutrients out of the intestine to the blood stream.

You can test for intestinal pathogens and learn the composition of the present microbiota and correct if needed so nutrients can access the blood properly. Candida is the most frequent pathogen, but is not the only culprit. Klebsiella is common as well. Many are stealth; others, such as Candida have fairly obvious symptoms.

Probiotics in high count are required to restore normal balance in the entire intestine. There are therapeutic probiotics...including the VSL #3 and specialty probiotics from companies that make nothing but probiotics for specific purposes.

Jackie

LIZ et al:

Regarding Mg causing AF, I noticed that Tom B several years ago posted that Mg caused was a cause of AF for himself. [www.afibbers.org]

Here Liz, PeggyM, and Jackie are all going at it on the same topic back 2013, with the Master-Fibber himself Hans Larsen
Moderating.

Also I have heard that in several categories of patients Mg is likely to make things worse.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2015 03:35PM by The Anti-Fib.

Anti Fib:

What is your point?

Liz

Moerk

You said "A licensed physician saying "there is no evidence" of supplement efficacy is an obvious lie to avoid censure, by licensing powers or by colleagues."

Can you please point me (and him) to high quality, double-blind, large-scale, peer-reviewed trials proving the effectiveness of magnesium etc?

I know they work, I take the big three every day to stop the discomfort of large numbers of ectopics. But in the UK there is now a big push towards evidence based medicine and without reliable evidence I don't think any doctor can recommend them.

Gill

Gill,

Everything you say is true and makes the point exactly, Regarding the requirement of formal studies to verify nutrient supplement efficacy is like needing proof of water's efficacy before recommending a thirsty person drink water.

But seriously, and for example, does not Mildred S. Seelig MD MPH's 1980 science tome Magnesium Deficiency in The Pathogenesis of Disease, with over 400 pages of text citing hundreds of studies beginning in the '30s, satisfy anyone's need for verification of magnesium efficacy?

Dr. Seelig's entire book has long been available online for any physician to read, free of charge, at [www.mgwater.com]

Since this is an AF forum: Chaper 9, Magnesium Deficiency and Cardiac Dysrhythmia [www.mgwater.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2015 07:25PM by Moerk.

Mork

I am sure that Dr. Mildred Seelig's book on Magnesium is not on most Doctors required reading list. I spoke to my EP about Magnesium and he told me it was tried, didn't work, so apparently that's that for most docs.

Your analogy about water is faulty----we have proof that water is needed, without it we would die. There is no proof that magnesium will stop AF, we know it helps but it doesn't stop it.

George N. takes large amounts of Mag., for him, it appears to work, however, he did go through a period where he was getting episodes of AF, what stopped it, according to George, was a strong dose of an anti-arrthymatic drug.

Liz

I feel I have to chime in about the comment that there is no proof regarding the effectiveness of supplements. Generally speaking, that is true.I've never seen another study that shows blood test results for before and after supplement use. If someone else has, I'd like to know about it. It doesn't necessarily mean the supplements are doing anything, but doctos in particular usually want "proof"..show them the numbers/data, etc.

In April 2014, my company actually had a study done in Freiburg, Germany that is worth noting, as the benefits were proven through blood tests. While this was not a large scale study, the results showed that the test subjects on average improved significantly in every marker measured (there were 25 markers). Those with elevated markers improved to an even greater extent. As improvements were shown for free radicals, inflammation and more, I now use these supplements religiously. www.freiburgstudy.com When test subjects were told to go off of the supplements after 6 months, their markers all went back to previous levels...or worse.

I still take some extra magnesium, and sometimes taurine, but overall, I'm doing well. Second and hopefully last ablation: June 2014.

Barb

Elizabeth -

You wrote, "Your analogy about water is faulty----we have proof that water is needed, without it we would die." The analogy is actually valid, not faulty, because without magnesium we would also die. Had you followed the links provided you would know that.

You also wrote about a "Doctors required reading list". Is there actually such a required reading list or did you just make it up?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/22/2015 02:35AM by Moerk.

This thread is excellent. There's consensus that reviving and clarifying "The List" and all the various reports of non-ablation success is of paramount importance. Those are what set this site apart and what truly need to be brought back to centre stage. Combined with some evidently active and motivated new posters, the scene would be set for ongoing experimentation and improvement.

I believe I qualify for The List with now 2 and 1/2 years fully free of both AF and ectopic beats. Full details of my successful ablation-free, totally-medication-free treatment protocol are at carrafibdietinfo.com

Briefly, my method is by diet alone, with calcium intake now limited to 300 mg/day, at a serum (blood) vitamin D level of approx 65 ng/mL (both levels which, throughout the Third World, correlate with very low levels of osteoporosis and heart disease compared to Western countries. My perfectly normal parathyroid hormone levels also indicate that this is fully sufficient calcium intake at this natural, fully-replete vitamin D level -- the level where serum vitamin D levels naturally plateau following plentiful sun exposure, which all our ancestors had.)

Highly significantly, both of these factors are core parts, which he has found to be critical, of the method of GeorgeN -- the only long-term poster with full elimination of AF without ablation (and recently without medication).

Where I differ from GeorgeN is in using zero* supplements such as magnesium.

My opinion, and this relates to Tsco's, Antifib's, Elizabeth's, Rob50's, and (mentioned) TomB's posts above, regarding the patchy effectiveness of magnesium (and/or potassium) supplements, is that magnesium supplements essentially act in a band-aid manner and that calcium is the true culprit, and that is why magnesium supplements work for some and not others. Everyone may recall their high-school chemistry, where magnesium and calcium, due to similar ionic radii and identical charge, are very interchangeable in many chemical reactions. This is no less true in the human body, and is discussed in old material on this site. So it is no surprise that extra magnesium may, up to some point, and for some individuals, suppress the adverse action of excess calcium (by swamping or substituting-for its presence in various reactions). But I believe it is clear that anomalies in calcium metabolism, particularly excess calcium and inadequate vitamin D, are the main culprit which are really at the root of the problem (related evidence and discussion at carrafibdietinfo.com), rather than magnesium. And I believe this is strongly borne out by achieving success with a natural diet alone, without magnesium or other supplements of any kind, focusing solely on things which affect calcium metabolism -- an achievement which would be totally impossible if calcium is not at the heart of the matter!

However, in my case, I found that there's one other factor required beyond just calcium reduction and vitamin D increase: the other most distinctive aspect of my diet is the consumption of 200 grams of pulped, frozen cranberries per day (which now appears to be as successful, at my recent 300 mg/day calcium intake, as my previous 500 grams/day of cranberries were at my previous ~480 mg/day calcium intake.) As documented on my website, there are ways in which various constituents of cranberries (and other "unimproved" fruits, of which our ancestors would have routinely consumed large quantities) also interact with calcium metabolism. I strongly urge other visitors to experiment with this simple, healthy-diet based method: calcium down, vitamin D up, and a couple of cups of cranberries per day, as a more natural alternative to large, unnatural doses of supplements.

Anyway, I strongly commend efforts to revive and clarify "The List", "Session 61" and as many reports of ablation-free, medication-free success as possible. These are a core aspect of this site's attraction and surely what many are seeking when they visit.

*I currently obtain my vitamin D from the sun, but, in the absence of significant sun exposure, approximately 28,000 IU of supplementary vitamin D per week -- the IOM's recommended maximum -- is a perfectly acceptable alternative.

Steve Carr

I'm wondering why my post on this was apparently deleted? Barb

Re-post it, Barb. I'd like to read what you contributed. It could just be a system glitch.

Jackie

Hi Barb,

I looked up the Frieburg study and Peak Perfomance Pack. It's quite expensive and fairly new. It evidently didn't fix your afib problems (additional supplements and ablations) but it looks interesting. Is there anything new in it that isn't one of the supplements talked about on this forum?

Barb -

On this computer your important information posted yesterday is still here.

Mork

We can only go without water for about 3 to 4 days---however, you are being fictitious, without all of the vitamins/electorlytes which most get from food, we would die, but this process would take a whole lot longer, Water is the most crucial to our survival.

L

Oh well then. Elizabeth, if your criterion is how long it takes to die from a nutrient deficiency, then an oxygen deficiency is clearly the quickest. Rephrasing my original, ". . . like needing proof of oxygen's efficacy before recommending breathing."

PeggyM ET AL:

I appreciate the work done to compile "The List" Posts. I was aware of, but I sort of forgot about Session 61, even though I have been visiting this site on and off for 5 years. Thanks to you, I have just now have become aware of "The list" posts effort since CR61 closed.

The new Forum Format will likely have a way of running an ongoing "Sticky Post" at the top of the Forum, that will just stay at top of the Forum list, and this can enable new "List" Posts to be made.

I agree with Steve's premise that calcium handling, and dysfunction there off, often with excess IC calcium as a manifestation is likely a core culprit and nearer to the fundamental biochemistry of AFIB, though it's not so simplistic as just a matter of dumping calcium from our diets either. One of magnesium's effects on the body and heart in particular is its action as a natural calcium channel blocker as well. It's even possible that in many folks in whom
Magnesium does help quiet the heart this relationship may be the prime one in its benefits in helping to moderate AFIB to
what ever variable degree it does seem associated with magnesium status.

Much of the cutting edge research in the biochemical origins of AFIB include intensive investigation into
calcium channel biochemistry and as I hav e noted in several AFIB reports the past year and a half and as Hans has pointed out as well in prior years.

Shannon