Studies of Inorganic Salts of the Blood in Psoriasis

Psoriasis is a disease of such obscure etiology that any investigations concerning it are worthy of publication. There is a factor that influences the activity or the quiescence of the eruptive manifestations in this disease. While numerous investigations along metabolic, bacteriologic and other lines have been intensively carried out, no dogmatic utterance as to the exact nature of psoriasis can at the present day be made. We examined the blood of twenty patients in various stages of activity for the calcium-potassium ratio and for the content of magnesium and phosphorus. These inorganic constituents of the blood did not materially depart from normal values. The normal figures for calcium, magnesium, potassium and phosphorus we take to be as follows: The technic employed was as follows: Tisdall's modification 1 of Kramer and Tisdall's 2 method was used for the calcium determinations.