Our data showed that, when compared to healthy control subjects, sepsis patients displayed markedly higher blood levels of PTH (Fig. 1d and Additional file 1: Table S1, 68.2 ± 7.7 vs. 10.6 ± 1.7 pmol/L, p < 0.001), FGF-23 (Fig. 1e and Additional file 1: Table S1, 7.3 ± 2.0 vs. 1.9 ± 0.4 ng/mL, p < 0.05), and creatinine (Fig. 1f and Additional file 1: Table S1, 1.5 ± 0.2 vs. 1.0 ± 0.1, p < 0.05), whereas showed significantly decreased blood levels of IGF-1 (Fig. 1g, 55.0 ± 3.7 vs. 77.3 ± 7.4 ng/mL, p < 0.01). The gene discussed is PTH; the disease is Sepsis.