[Intact serum parathormone (PTH 1-84). A suitable parameter for the diagnosis of calcium metabolism disorders]

Intact parathormone (PTH 1-84) was measured with a new immunoradiometric method in serum from 83 children and adults with various abnormalities of calcium metabolism. The results were compared with those of an assay of midregional PTH fraction (44-68). Both measurements discriminated well between normal controls and patients with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism. In patients in chronic renal failure intact PTH measurement was best for demonstrating parathyroid secretion. An important advantage of the new method is in the diagnosis of PTH hyposecretion in hypoparathyroidism and of tumour hypercalcaemia, which is not possible by mid-regional PTH determination. Intravenous injection of calcium (2 mg/kg over 5 min) and of synthetic PTH fragment (6 U/kg 1-38 hPTH over 2 min) caused a reduction in intact serum-PTH to about half the initial value after five minutes. Measuring intact PTH is thus a suitable method for determining both raised and decreased parathyroid secretion in disease and in the course of function tests. It is simple to perform, subject to only minor interference, and thus suitable also as a routine laboratory test.