Letter to the Editor
Scurvy
Ivan Krečak
orcid.org/0000-0002-8642-305X
; Department of Internal Medicine, General Hospital of Šibenik-Knin County, Šibenik, Croatia Faculty of Medicine, University of Rijeka, Rijeka, Croatia
Gordan Babić
; Department of Internal Medicine, General Hospital of Šibenik-Knin County, Šibenik, Croatia Faculty of Medicine, University of Rijeka, Rijeka, Croatia
Marko Skelin
; Pharmacy Department, General Hospital of Šibenik-Knin County, Šibenik, Croatia 3Department of Basic and Clinical Pharmacology with Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ri-jeka, Rijeka, Croatia
Abstract
Scurvy is a nutritional disorder which can develop
after prolonged (>1-3 months) severe vitamin C deficiency. Vitamin C is a cofactor in several enzyme reactions involved in collagen synthesis. The defect in collagen causes blood vessel fragility, poor wound healing, mucocutaneous bleedings, hair abnormalities, bone pains, and joint contractures due to perios-teal and intraarticular bleeding (1,2). Risk factors for scurvy development are undernutrition, low socio-economic status, older age, male sex, alcoholism, tobacco smoking, and severe psychiatric illnesses (1-3). The required daily intake for vitamin C is ~60 mg, and this amount of vitamin C can be found in only one medium-sized orange. For this reason, the disease is rarely encountered in developed countries and is often underrecognized by healthcare personnel. Here-in, we present an illustrative case of scurvy in order to raise the awareness of this disorder.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
280216
URI
Publication date:
1.4.2022.
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