[Changes in the thyroid function during treatment of psychiatric disorders using lithium salts]. / Alterazioni della funzionalità tiroidea durante il trattamento di disturbi psichiatrici con sale di litio.

Lithium, a monovalent cation used mainly in the management of certain psychiatric disorders, appears to act on thyroid function and to interfere with T3 and T4 secretion. The authors have followed 10 patients treated with lithium salts for two years and have monitored some parameters of thyroid function. Clinical and laboratory signs of hypothyroidism appeared in one case and subsided after withdrawal of lithium treatment.

Diffuse idiopathic skeletal hyperostosis and situs viscerum inversus.

We describe a 74-year-old woman with diffuse idiopathic skeletal hyperostosis (DISH) and situs viscerum inversus. The radiographic alterations typical of DISH were present only on the left side of her thoracic spine. The role of the thoracic aorta in preventing DISH adjacent to its side and some pathogenetic aspects of this skeletal disorder are discussed.