A Right Royal Porphyria Fallacy

A right Royal porphyria fallacy.

We were intrigued by the cover image for the November 2011 issue of Clinical Chemistry, which showed a cover picture claiming that Mary Queen of Scots had a diagnosis of acute porphyria. The diagnosis of porphyria is usually assigned when a presenting patient is currently symptomatic; the range of indicative symptoms is diverse but relatively well defined. The 3 most common acute porphyrias are...

Porphyria—a Royal Malady*

FARMFR GEORGE was a mad king, and so we lost the American colonies: such in brief is the recollection of what the man-in-the-street garnered at school. It is remarkable that so little attention has been paid to the nature of George III's malady, and it is a sad reflection on British medical historians that during the 200 years that have elapsed since his first overt attack of illness, there hav...

Porphyria - a Royal Malady

A right royal rumpus

People in more mature democracies may wonder why the British media disseminate so feverishly the opinions of someone described as ‘His Royal Highness’. Puzzlement was doubly justified recently when The Daily Telegraph published an article — flagged by other newspapers with headlines such as “Charles warns against genetic foods” — which it then largely demolished in an editorial. Prince Charles ...

Acute intermittent porphyria after right hemi-colectomy☆

INTRODUCTION Acute intermittent porphyria is a rare autosomal dominant metabolic disease. It is caused by a genetic mutation that results in deficiency of porphobilinogen deaminase enzyme, the third enzyme in heme biosynthesis. Acute intermittent porphyria precipitated by surgery is very rare. CASE PRESENTATION We present a 24 year-old woman who developed acute intermittent porphyria five day...