Osteocalcin and bone remodelling in Paget's disease of bone, primary hyperparathyroidism, hypercalcaemia of malignancy and involutional osteoporosis.

We have measured classic markers of bone turnover, serum alkaline phosphatase (sAP), urinary hydroxyproline/creatinine ratio (uOH-Prol/creatinine) and osteocalcin (sBGP), in two bone disorders characterized by an increase in bone remodelling, namely Paget's disease of bone and primary hyperparathyroidism (PHPT) and in two other bone diseases characterized by an increase in bone resorption without the concomitant increase in bone formation, hypercalcaemia of malignancy (HM) and involutional osteoporosis (IO). Serum BGP was increased in patients with Paget's disease of bone (6.7 +/- 3.1; n = 25; p less than 0.01) and in PHPT patients (8.3 +/- 5.3; n = 20; p less than 0.005) with respect to control patients (4.2 +/- 1.2 ng/ml; n = 12). Two subgroups of patients with high and normal levels of sBGP were found in both pathologies. Serum BGP was decreased in HM patients (2.1 +/- 1.7; n = 9; p less than 0.01) and in IO patients (1.9 +/- 1.4; n = 31; p less than 0.001). Two subgroups of patients with normal and low sBGP values were found in these two last disorders. A positive linear correlation was found between sBGP and sAP (y = 14.6x + 73.7; r = 0.44; p less than 0.05) and between sBGP and uOH-Prol/creatinine (y = 0.008x + 0.007; r = 0.67; p less than 0.001) in Paget's disease of bone.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)