Hospital Physician March 2008 21 D iabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) is a serious and potentially life-threatening complication of diabetes mellitus.1,2 It represents a state of insulin deficiency with a concurrent elevation in counterregulatory hormones.2–6 The annual incidence ranges from 4.6 to 8 cases per 1000 diabetic patients, and DKA carries a mortality rate of 2% to 10%.2 DKA occurs more commo...

Both the cow and the sheep are susceptible to ketosis. In the cow the clinical condition is termed primary spontaneous bovine ketosis and in the sheep, pregnancy toxaemia. Bovine ketosis occurs typically in the third to eighth week of lactation in mature heavily lactating diary cows. Pregnancy toxaemia occufs in late pregnancy in ewes bearing two or more lambs. Both conditions are associated wi...

It is well known that in most human subjects ketosis appears -when the material metabolized becomes restricted to protein and fat. This condition is observed after several days of fasting, on diets deficient in carbohydrate, and in diabetes in consequence of the loss of ability to metabolize carbohydrate. These facts have led to the view that a certain minimum combustion of carbohy,drate is nec...

Fernandes, J., and Pikaar, N. A. (1972). Archives of Disease in Childhood, 47, 41. Ketosis in hepatic glycogenosis. The occurrence of ketosis in 41 patients with liver glycogenosis and a control group of 22 children was investigated. Fasting ketosis was present in children with a deficiency of the debranching enzyme system and in young children with a deficiency of the phosphorylase system, but...

ever good the treatment, cases of true coma often die. Moreover, diabetic coma is rarely of acute onset ; at least twenty-four hours (and usually several days), elapse during which gross ketosis develops before the onset of loss of consciousness and circulatory collapse. The best insurance policy therefore in the prevention of diabetic coma is the regular testing of the urine for ketone bodies....

Congenital temporary diabetes mellitus is a rare syndrome occurring in the first.six weeks of life. It differs from classical juvenile-onset diabetes mellitus in infants in that it is transient, with complete recovery after three to four months. There is usually no family history of diabetes mellitus. The affected infants are underweight, yet full-term, with severe dehydration. The neonate has ...

Type 1 diabetes has become one of the most studied polygenic disorders. It effects over 1.4 million people in the US, with a rising incidence in many western nations. It is clear that there is a strong hereditary component in the development of disease, with siblings at higher risk than offspring and both at higher risk than the general population. It is also clear that autoimmunity plays a lar...

Neurological deterioration in children with diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) is commonly caused by cerebral edema. However, subtle cerebral injuries including strokes should also be suspected, since children with hyperglycemia and DKA are prone to thrombosis. In this paper, a case involving a 2 month-old patient that presented cerebral edema and stroke as complications of DKA is reported. In the dis...

It is now established that the dysmature infant, of low birthweight for the period of gestation, may develop a diabetic state in the neonatal period (Arey, 1953; Engleson and Zetterqvist, 1957; Hutchison, Keay, and Kerr, 1962). This condition, which is temporary and has a good prognosis, has to be distinguished from other causes of hyperglycaemia. Permanent diabetes mellitus occurs rarely in th...