Impaired glucose tolerance was present in 20% of children with cystic fibrosis. Impaired insulin secretion was common (65%) even in children with normal glucose tolerance. The mean height SDS for the group was low and the height velocity was abnormally slow in 39%, yet nutritional status as measured by BMI was appropriate for age. Relative insulin deficiency rather than nutritional deprivation or poor clinical status thus appears to be implicated in the poor linear growth of these children with relatively stable lung disease. This was a small study and firm conclusions on this chronic suppurative disease as to the cause of poor growth are not possible. The causes of poor growth are likely to be complex; nevertheless, the apparent decrease in insulin secretion combined with the expected increased demands on insulin production during pubertal growth raises the question as to whether insulin therapy should be considered in children with cystic fibrosis before the onset of cystic fibrosis-related diabetes mellitus.

This report provides a further link between deficiency of the iNKT/CD1d pathway and increased susceptibility to varicella vaccine virus, suggesting an important role of this innate pathway in host defense against yet another member of the herpesvirus family.

EightyThe relative importance of corneal and scleral rigidity and of corneal thinning in the measurement of intraocular pressure is not clearly This study was planned to investigate a group of patients with keratoconus to determine which of these previously reported findings could be substantiated and to identify other possible factors which could be important in the routine clinical measurement of intraocular pressure in patients with low corneal rigidity or corneal thinning. MATERIALSEighty-five patients with keratoconus and 20 normal controls were concurrently investigated. The normal controls were emmetropic, with normal corneal thickness (0.53 k 0.03 mm),' normal corneal curvature (mean radius of curvature 7.7 k 0.2 mm, corneal astigmatism 0.4 k 0.3 di~ptres),~ normal intraocular pressure (13 k 2 mmHg)* and normal axial length of the eye (23.57 k0.91 mm).9The mean age of the 12 male and eight female control subjects was 36 f 17 years (range 14-67) Reprint requests: Anne M. V. Brooks,

Adverse events are common with BAL in young CF children, but are usually transient and well tolerated. Parents should be counseled that signs of a pre-existing lower respiratory infection are associated with increased risk of post-BAL fever.