Although it has been known for many years that vitamin D is implicated in the metabolism of calcium, the exact biochemical mechanism of its action is still not clear. There have been reports that yeast (Braude, Kon & White, 1943), some grasses and other leafy vegetable matter (Ewer & Bartrum, 1948; Grant, 1951; Weits, 1952; Raoul, Marnay, Le Boulch, Prelot, Guerillot-Vinet, Bazier & Baron, 1957...

REFERENCES 1 Leyten EMS, Prins C, Bossink AWJ, et al. Effect of tuberculin skin testing on a Mycobacterium tuberculosis-specific interferon-c assay. Eur Respir J 2007; 29: 1212–1216. 2 National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. Tuberculosis: clinical diagnosis and management of tuberculosis, and measures for its prevention and control. Clinical Guideline 33. National Institute for C...

The first mammals were probably nocturnal (McNab 1978; Kemp 1982) and many extant orders of small mammals have retained this trait. This behaviour is presumably due to the measure of protection from predation that darkness provides (Crawford 1934; Falls 1968; Daan and Aschoff 1982). Large, herbivorous mammals are less restricted to the nocturnal phase (e.g. Bunnell and Harestad 1990) and have b...

A 66-year-old female patient developed severe Serratia liquefaciens sepsis following vitamin C infusion treatment by a naturopathic practitioner. The clinical course of the infection was characterized by several complications, and the direct costs of the hospital stay amounted to about 40000 Euro. Genotypically identical S. liquefaciens was isolated from the residue of the infusate given to the...

The recent paper by Ewer et al 1 and an accompanying editorial 2 in the Lancet raised the question of universal pulse oximetry screening of newborn infants on the postnatal ward prior to discharge. In the Republic of Ireland there are 75,000 births annually, distributed across nineteen maternity units. We surveyed all of these units regarding the use of oxygen saturation screening on the postna...