Today, I will speak only of the preparation of sick persons for the operation. At a dose of I gram 20 mg. Taken continuously, it brings them out in many persons who are chronically constipated, and reduces them in many who are diarrhetic. In a few days, if their diets contain nothing particularly toxic, it deodorizes them. That can be due only to a modification of the intestinal flora, but I haven't succeeded in noting what the modification consists of.
Magnesium chloride stimulates the biliary system.
Perhaps this is the mechanism by which it regularizes salts. The head of my clinic, M. de Vadder , who makes duodenal tubage in my service, has observed at my request that the injection of magnesium chloride into the duodenum brings out a wave of vesical bile. In the first paragraph of this chapter, I admitted to being a compiler, but on the subject of magnesium's effect on body odor, I went a step further. I made myself a guinea pig. I wanted to see its effects on me before I recommended it to others.