Monitoring of serum ionized magnesium in neurosurgical intensive care unit: preliminary results

Background: Our purpose was to determine the values for serum ionized magnesium (Mg) concentrations in traumatic brain injury and its effect on the prognostic scores of patients. Methods: We prospectively measured serum ionized magnesium concentrations in 30 patients that were classified into three groups (severe, moderate, mild) by Glasgow Coma Scale Score. Serum ionized magnesium concentrations were measured during posttraumatic 5 days. Thirty patients with head trauma were followed in a neurosurgical intensive care unit with monitoring serum ionized magnesium concentrations. All patients were treated conservatively. Results: We found significant difference of serum ionized magnesium concentrations when we compared all groups with each other (p<0.001). Conclusions: Based on this clinical preliminary study, traumatic brain injury is associated with graded deficit in serum ionized magnesium concentrations. Thus, measurement of serum ionized magnesium concentrations can be used as a clinical marker in traumatic brain injury. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.