Distribution of the perilacunar hypomineralized areas in cortical bone from patients with familial hypophosphatemic (vitamin D-resistant) rickets.

The perilacunar areas of low mineral density in microradiographs from cortical bone of patients with hypophosphatemic (vitamin D-resistant) rickets are not evenly distributed throughout the bone tissue. Their frequency and distribution were determined in bone from 9 patients with this disease. It was found that the lesion was more frequent in haversian bone than in interstitial bone, and along the inner circumference of growing haversian systems as compared with outer circumference. These findings indicate that the lesion is the result of retarded mineralization, and that mineralization slowly proceeds in these areas as the bone becomes older. A relatively high frequency of the lesion was also found in osteons with an elliptical cross section along the long axis of the ellipse. The cause of the abundance of the lesion at these sites is not clear, but it is possible to explain the uneven distribution in elliptical osteons by assuming an unequal rate of bone formation in these structures.