ABSTRACT
The parathyroid gland was discovered by Sir Richard Owen in 1851 in a rhinoceros. At the time it was unknown what the gland did and parathyroid hormone (PTH) was only identified in 1954. The introduction of the multichannel biochemical autoanalyzer in the 1960s resulted in primary hyperparathyroidism becoming one of the commonest endocrine disorders. The incidence of primary hyperparathyroidism is approximately 1 in 1000 in the adult population 1 .
