Rickets in children receiving anticonvulsant drugs. Biochemical and hormonal markers.

Forty-one epileptic children, aged 2 to 16 years, receiving combinations of phenobarbital, phenytoin, and primidone, and 39 control children were studied. The epileptics demonstrated slight but significant reductions in serum calcium, phosphorus, and 25-hydroxyvitamin D concentrations, and a significant increase in serum alkaline phosphatase values. No significant difference in serum immunoreactive parathyroid hormone levels was noted.

Impaired release of parathyroid hormone in magnesium deficiency.

Parathyroid hormone release and end-organ responsiveness to parathyroid extract (PTE) were evaluated in a 25-year-old woman with magnesium deficiency associated with hypocalcemia and inappropriately low levels of serum immunoreactive parathyroid hormone (iPTH). End-organ responsiveness to PTE was demonstrated by increases in serum calcium and in urinary phosphorus, cyclic AMP, and hydroxyproline. When the serum calcium was increased from a baseline of 6.

Serum calcitonin-lowering effect of magnesium in patients with medullary carcinoma of the thyroid.

The effect of magnesium chloride or magnesium sulfate infusion on circulating levels of immunoreactive calcitonin (iCT) was evaluated on nine occasions in three patients with metastatic medullary carcinoma of the thyroid. One patient was normocalcemic and had normal circulating levels of immunoreactive parathyroid hormone (iPTH), one patient was hypocalcemic and had surgical hypoparathyroidism, and one patient had mild to moderate hypercalcemia associated with bone metastases. The basal serum iPTH levels were undetectable in the latter two patients.