Dr. Kassai Tibor szerk.: Parasitologia Hungarica 2. (Budapest, 1969)
the results of KATSAMPES • s et al. (8) vitamin A tests, we found that absorption efficiency was impaired in patients infected with G.L. However with a healthy control child, whose hypovitaminosis was not due to giardiasis, the vitamin level remained normal after supplementation. Thus, supplementation by ixself does not bring about improvement of the vitamin A status, a finding characteristic of secondary hypovitaminosis (16) . b. / In the early spring months children living in state homes could obtain only carrots as a natural source of carotene. A group of ten infected patients was given, besides their daily food, 6 mg of beta-carotene in the form of grated carrots over a four day period. However, this caused no significant change in the vitamin A status (median: from 4-2,8 IU/lOO ml to 51,0 IU/100 ml); on the other hand there was a significant increase in the level of serum carotene (median:'from 63,0 /ig/lOO ml to 152,0 g/lOO ml); indicating that giardiasis disturbs the con version of beta-carotene to vitamin A . c. / Of 29 infected children 21 were treated with atabrine 8 with imidazole derivatives. Recovery from the parasitic infection was checked by repeated examinations of the stools. Without any dietary change successful treatment with both drugs resulted in a significant increase in the vitamin A status (median: from 52,5 IU/100 ml to 90,0 IU/lOO ml) (P ig. 2). In four cases in which treatment was not effective, the vitamin A status remained unchanged. As a result of successful therapy, the level of serum carotene fell in relation to the rise in vitamin A (P ig. 3). Dotted lines in the'figure refer to the volunteer who received the same therapy as infected subjects. Future investigations will seek to determine whether the results are caused by the change in the ratio of the active-inactive pigments (14). GUGGENHEIM (15) reported that when rats were given prolonged treatment with atabrine, an anti-malarial drug, hepatic storage of vitamin A was adversely affected. d. / Ten children received a combined cure, namely, after treat-
