Studies on the Pantothenic Acid Deficiency (II)

On the diagnosis and treatment of human pantothenic acid deficiency

Abstract

Seven patients with pantothenic acid deficiency were observed in the past two and a half years. They had characteristic symptoms very similar to those elicited by experimental administration of w-methyl pantothenic acid in human subjects. Those symptoms were improved rapidly by administration of 50 to 100 mg of D-pantothenic acid in all cases, but scarcely by administration of other vitamins. As a rule, the diagnosis was rather easy owing to specific symptoms in those cases, though it was noteworthy that all of them had been diagnosed wrongly and treated inappropriately before visiting our clinic, A proposal was made to designate this syndrome as “pseudotabes apantothenica (Tasaka)”.