Two elements sit next to each other on the electrolyte row of a hair mineral analysis, and dividing one by the other gives the number both major laboratories treat as the adrenal reading. Neither says much alone. Their ratio says a great deal, because adrenal activity pushes the two in opposite directions at once.
Results are reported in milligrams percent. Both lineages publish an ideal and a band around it, and they sit close enough that the honest way to quote them is as a range.
| Reading | Ideal | Acceptable band |
|---|---|---|
| Na/Mg — the adrenal ratio | 4 – 4.17 | 2 – 6 (Trace Elements) · 3.17 – 6.17 (ARL) |
| Sodium, mg% | 24 – 25 | — |
| Magnesium, mg% | 6 | — |
The narrower ARL band is a difference in how much drift each lab will call acceptable, not a disagreement about where the centre sits.
Read the ratio, not the elements. An ideal sodium of 24 mg% over an ideal magnesium of 6 mg% divides out to exactly 4. A sodium of 36 with a magnesium of 4 produces a ratio of 9 — and because neither lab publishes an acceptable band for sodium or magnesium as levels, nothing on either individual line does the flagging that the ratio does. The relationship carries information the levels do not.
Sodium is retained. Aldosterone, the mineralocorticoid, governs renal sodium retention, and the ARL rule is blunt: in general, the higher the sodium level, the higher the aldosterone level. Watts' retention table puts sodium in the retained column for adrenal cortical activity. Magnesium is excreted. The same table puts magnesium in the excreted column — raised adrenal cortical and medullary activity increases magnesium excretion, while reduced adrenal activity increases magnesium retention.
So the element that rises and the element that falls are the numerator and the denominator of one fraction. If sodium climbs 30 percent while magnesium drops 25 percent, each element has moved only modestly — but the quotient has moved by roughly three quarters, carrying it outside the acceptable band at both labs. A signal either level alone would understate becomes obvious the moment they are divided. ARL adds a reason to trust this pair specifically: sodium and magnesium are rarely lost through the hair itself, so falsely low readings are uncommon.
Watts organises interpretation gland by gland rather than through one metabolic rate, and Na/Mg appears in two of those rows. Above 4 it sits in the increased-activity column for both the adrenal cortex and the thyroid; below 4, in the decreased column for both. These are activity trends read from mineral relationships, nothing more.
| Gland | Increased-activity trend | Decreased-activity trend |
|---|---|---|
| Adrenal cortex (anabolic) | Na/Mg > 4, Na/K > 5, Ca/Mg > 10 | Na/Mg < 4, Ca/K < 4.2 |
| Thyroid | Na/Mg > 4, Ca/K < 4, Fe/Cu > 2 | Na/Mg < 4, Ca/K > 4, Fe/Cu < 1.1, Zn/Cu > 8 |
Na/Mg above 4 alongside Ca/Mg above 10 is the pattern Watts places in the increased adrenal-activity column - an activity trend read from mineral relationships on a screening test, not an identification of any condition. The two glands appearing together is no coincidence: in the ARL model, Ca/K and Na/Mg are the only two ratios that set the oxidation type — fast is Ca/K below 4 with Na/Mg above 4.17, slow is Ca/K above 4 with Na/Mg below 4.17, and both readings on the same side of their ideals is mixed. ARL's own trend table for the ratio adds an energy column, which is where the practical consequence lives.
| Na/Mg | Trend | Energy trend (ARL table) |
|---|---|---|
| 16 and above | Extremely raised adrenal activity | 50% and above |
| 8 – 16 | Moderately raised | 25 – 50% |
| 4.17 – 8 | Mildly raised | 10 – 25% |
| 4 – 4.17 | Ideal | None |
| 2 – 4.17 | Mildly sluggish | 10 – 25% |
| 1 – 2 | Moderately sluggish | 25 – 50% |
| Below 1 | The table's most emphatic low reading | 50% and above |
ARL's framing for that column is an engine turning too slowly or too fast: either way, power output falls. Deviation in either direction costs energy, which is why a high adrenal ratio is not read as a good result.
A low Na/Mg also rarely arrives alone. ARL groups five readings as evidence of a reduced adrenal-output trend, and the more of them present the stronger the reading: sodium under about 25 mg%, potassium under 10 mg%, Na/K under 2.5, Na/Mg under 4.17, Ca/K over 10. Where a chart sits in the stress sequence is a separate question, read mainly from Na/K, and it has its own article on the stages.
ARL states this one as a standing instruction rather than a caution: sodium can be raised by cadmium, mercury, copper, iron and nickel, any of which lifts the reading temporarily while adrenal output is genuinely low. Look at every chart for these metals before interpreting the adrenal ratio.
Cadmium is the clearest mechanism: it exerts an aldosterone-like effect that raises tissue sodium directly, producing a high Na/Mg on a person whose adrenal picture is nothing of the kind. The limits that flag those metals are tight — mercury under 0.10 mg%, cadmium under 0.04, lead under 0.5, aluminum under 1.0, arsenic under 0.020 — and levels are only half of it. A metal inside its limit can still be a problem against the nutrient that opposes it, which is why the report also carries minimum ratios such as Zn/Cd at 500:1 and Ca/Pb at 84:1.
Trace Elements analyses samples unwashed, for one reason: washing removes over 90% of the sodium and potassium. A washed sample does not give a slightly less accurate sodium ratio — it gives a meaningless one, because the numerator has largely gone down the drain.
Step-by-step guidance is on the sample collection page, and the same instructions ship in the box with the test kit.
Waking in the small hours is one of the most common things people bring to a first hair analysis, so it is worth being exact. A hair tissue mineral analysis is a screening test for nutritional and toxic element status. It does not diagnose a sleep disorder, and nothing here explains any individual's night waking.
What is true is where a practitioner looks first: the adrenal ratio and the blood-sugar side of the chart, because both bear on how steadily the body holds itself through the hours when nothing is arriving from food. On the blood-sugar side that means Ca/Mg, ideal 6.67 to 7, alongside Na/K and a low potassium reading. The Watts material adds a clean discriminator: difficulty falling asleep trends toward calcium, while falling asleep easily and waking repeatedly trends toward magnesium — the same element in the denominator here. Those are trends read from minerals, and they sit alongside a medical conversation rather than replacing one.
This article covers the numbers. The companion piece on EileenDurfee.com covers the experience — what the 3 a.m. hour is actually like.
Na/Mg is a trigger reading in the Endo-met indication logic, and it points two ways depending on which side of 4 it falls.
None of that is a recommendation for any particular person. Which formulas apply, in what order and at what strength is read from your own chart — and dosing is written on the report as a schedule such as 1-1-0 or 2-2-2 across morning, noon and evening, set by the practitioner from the numbers rather than from a bottle label. Our hand-selected Endo-met formulas and Trace Elements range fill what a report calls for.
Curated by Practitioner Eileen Durfee, NBS (Nutritional Balancing Science), NASM-CPT — wellness educator, former nuclear quality engineer, inventor with 10 U.S. and 6 international patents
I came to hair analysis in 2010, under ARNP Julie Walker in Kennewick, Washington. I worked directly with Analytical Research Labs testing family and friends, listened to every cassette Dr. Paul Eck recorded and read every ARL newsletter. I signed up with Dr. Larry Wilson in August 2011 and have practised independently since autumn 2017.
The engineering background is what makes me watch this ratio the way I do. In quality work you learn quickly that the reading which looks worst is often not the one that matters — what matters is whether the measurement was taken correctly to begin with. A high sodium number is exactly that kind of reading. Before I interpret it I want to know whether the sample was washed, and whether cadmium, mercury, copper, iron or nickel is lifting sodium for reasons that have nothing to do with the adrenals.
The most common misunderstanding about this reading is the assumption that hair sodium reflects what goes on the food. It usually does not. It usually does not. If you have a report and are not sure how to read it, send it over — walking people through their own numbers is what the text support is for.
Because hair sodium is not a record of dietary intake. The prime regulator of tissue sodium is aldosterone, so the reading tracks adrenal activity far more than the salt shaker. ARL makes the reverse point just as plainly: where adrenal output is low, tissue sodium generally stays low however much salt goes on the plate.
No. It is a screening test for nutritional and toxic element status, not a diagnostic test, and it cannot identify the cause of anyone's night waking. It can show whether the adrenal and blood-sugar ratios sit away from centre — information a practitioner uses alongside, not instead of, a conversation with your doctor about sleep.
Please settle that with whoever oversees your programme rather than on the strength of an article. Magnesium is a sedative mineral in this model and pushes the metabolic rate down, so it is indicated for some patterns and unhelpful for others. Which one applies is what the chart is for, and the amount and timing come from the report.
Not for any sodium ratio. Washing strips over 90% of the sodium and potassium, so Na/Mg and Na/K both lose their meaning while the calcium and magnesium side of the chart survives better. If the adrenal reading is what you are after, the sample has to be analysed unwashed.
This article is for educational purposes only. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Hair tissue mineral analysis is a screening test for nutritional and toxic element status and is not a diagnostic test. Nuco Enterprise Solutions LLC.
