To the Editor.—The following is a brief recording which suggests that psychological stress may influence the mineral content of human breast milk.
A female infant was born four weeks prematurely following an uncomplicated delivery, and weighed 2,295 gm (5 lb 1 oz) at birth. Results of her admission and discharge physical examinations in the newborn nursery were unremarkable. The infant was started on a regimen of breast milk feedings without difficulty.
She was readmitted to the Santa Clara Kaiser Foundation Hospital on March 3, 1971, at 3 weeks of age, with a history of sudden onset of cyanosis and severe respiratory distress of approximately two hours' duration. X-ray films of the chest revealed multiple cystic formations of the left lung with marked mediastinal shift to the right. A thoracotomy and a lobectomy of the upper lobe of the left lung were performed five hours following admission. Microscopic examination of