Calcium infusion test in osteomalacia: an appraisal.

Nordin and Fraser (1956), as well as many other authors, have reported that patients with osteomalacia retain more of an infused dose of calcium than normal persons. A high retention of infused calcium by itself has been taken as diagnostic of osteomalacia (Harvald et al., 1962 ; Deller et al., 1963; Thompson et al., 1966). Nordin and Fraser suggested that the calcium retained in osteomalacia was taken up by the uncalcified bone matrix-that is, osteoid tissue. If this was so then the amount of calcium retained should be related to the amount of osteoid. We report here the relation between calcium retention and the amount of osteoid in trabecular bone in 15 patients.