Which vitamin deficiency causes scurvy?
Answer and explanation
Correct answer: C. Vitamin C
- Step 1: Scurvy is a systemic disease characterized by bleeding gums, subcutaneous bruising, loss of teeth, and impaired wound healing.
- Step 2: These pathological symptoms arise from defective collagen synthesis due to a deficiency in ascorbic acid (Vitamin C), an indispensable cofactor for prolyl and lysyl hydroxylases.
- Step 3: Vitamin D deficiency causes rickets, Vitamin A deficiency causes night blindness, and Vitamin K deficiency causes coagulopathy.
Answer
Vitamin C.
Why not the others: Vitamin K deficiency causes impaired blood coagulation and haemorrhagic diathesis due to defective -carboxylation of clotting factors; Vitamin D deficiency impairs calcium absorption and causes rickets in children and osteomalacia in adults; Vitamin A deficiency causes nyctalopia (night blindness) and xerophthalmia.
Practise more Human reproduction and health.
Free questions with an explanation for every one, and full timed NEET UG mock tests.