Introduction

The use of stable isotopes has long been considered to be a promising tool in biomedical diagnosis. Despite the fact that stable isotope methodology has been known for decades, the application in clinical daily routine is limited. There are various reasons to explain this discrepancy:

• Expensive instruments to analyse isotopic enrichments and technical knowledge are restricted to a limited number of centres

• A gap exists in interaction between specialised stable isotope centres and potentially interested clinicians

• Lack of standardisation of …