ABSTRACT
The prevalence of hypercalcemia in tuberculosis in Hong Kong and its occurrence in relation to the radiographic extent of disease were studied in 57 patients with sputum smear (n = 44) and/or culture positive (n = 13) pulmonary tuberculosis and in five patients with military tuberculosis prior to treatment. Only one (1.6%) patient had a corrected plasma calcium level above the reference range for our laboratory. There was a positive relationship between the corrected plasma calcium levels and the radiographic extent of disease (r = 0.37), p < 0.01). As the occurrence of hypercalcemia in tuberculosis is known to be influenced by the calcium intake, our finding of a low prevalence of "absolute" hypercalcemia in Hong Kong could be related to the low dietary calcium intake in these subjects.