The use of food comparisons to describe the appearances and smells of disease must be given a revival in the medical literature, according to a report.

"A host of references to the aromas, shape, colour and texture of food have reinforced and stimulated generations of physicians to identify and understand disease," Dr. Ritu Lakhtakia of the pathology department at Sultan Qaboos University in Muscat, Oman, writes in Thursday's issue of the journal Medical Humanities.

"It is time to revisit this powerful tool and secure its place in medical teaching and records."

Dairy products were said to feature prominently. Necrotic tissue exuded "creamy" pus, "milk patch" described the appearance of healed inflamed membranes surrounding the heart, while "cafe au lait" was a term applied to the tell-tale skin colouring associated with the genetic disorder Von Recklinghausen's disease.

One possible reason for the food preoccupation might be doctors' (strong) stomachs, Dr Lakhtakia suggests.

She adds: "A part of this curious tradition may owe its origins to practising physicians and researchers catching up on their meals in clinical side rooms or operating theatre offices, or with an inevitably cold platter eaten with eyes glued to a microscope.

"It is a wonder that, in the midst of the smells and sights of human affliction, a physician has the stomach to think of food at all.

"Whatever the genesis, these time-honoured allusions have been, and will continue to be, a lively learning inducement for generations of budding physicians."