cAMP and Calcemia

Excerpt

Hypercalcemia is a common and vexing clinical problem. The clinician must decide whether serum calcium is raised because of hyperparathyroidism or one of eight or more other causes, each requiring remarkably different treatments. Over the past several decades a number of tests have been proposed to assist in the differential diagnosis of hypercalcemia. In general, each test has been greeted with enthusiasm only to fall into clinical disfavor because of difficulties in applying it in ambiguous cases. The measurement of parathyroid hormone (PTH) by radioimmunoassay is among the most sophisticated of such tests, but technical and biological problems appear to