Determination of selenium in blood serum of children with acute leukemia and effect of chemotherapy on serum selenium level.

The concentration of selenium in serum was measured by the neutron activation method in three groups of children: 30 healthy children, 20 children with Acute Myeloblastic Leukemia (AML) and 40 with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) (L1; n = 20, L2; n = 20). The samples were taken before and after induction chemotherapy. Age, sex, FAB, initial WBC, BUN, creatinine and urinary analysis did not show a significant change in the amount of selenium in serum. Selenium concentration in serum samples of ALL children before chemotherapy showed no significant differences as compared with that of normal individuals, but there were significant differences between children with AML and normal individuals (76.46 +/- 24.59 micrograms/L vs 102.38 +/- 19.25 micrograms/L, with p < 0.02). In conclusion, the question of whether these deficiencies are responsible for the disease or are the result of a secondary effect of the cancer remain to be answered. Immediately after induction chemotherapy, the selenium concentration in the serum of ALL children decreased significantly (80.14 +/- 15.48 micrograms/L vs 110.72 +/- 28.3 micrograms/L, p < 0.001), but this was not the case for AML children. These findings may be due to the difference in the drugs administered in induction chemotherapy of ALL and AML children.