Background: Serum lipid profile assay forms one of the special investigations in most chemical pathology laboratories worldwide. Several studies in children from different countries have shown that serum lipids exhibit age and geographical pattern of variation prior to puberty. This study was conducted to evaluate serum lipid profile in Nigerian children aged 6 to 36 months. Methods: A total of 115 randomly selected apparently healthy children were studied. These consisted of 38, 40 and 37 children in groups I (6 to 12 months), II (13 to 24 months) and III (25 to 36 months) respectively. There were 60 male and 55 female children. Serum concentrations of total cholesterol (TC), high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), triglyceride (TG) were measured by enzymatic colorimetric method using reagent kits supplied by Human, Gesel Für Biochemica Und Diagnostica mbH (Wiesbaden, Germany). Serum low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and very low density lipoprotein cholesterol (VLDL-C) were subsequently estimated using Friedewald formula.
A B S T R A C TBackground: There are reports from many parts of the world on the increased activity of serum total alkaline phosphatase (TALP) in pregnant women, especially during the last half of pregnancy. There is no such documented fi nding in this environment. There is the need to determine the serum TALP activity in different stages of normal 3 rd trimester pregnancy in Zaria to allow for proper interpretation of this analyte at this stage of pregnancy. Subjects and Methods: A cross sectional descriptive study carried out among 100 healthy pregnant women in their 3 rd trimester. They were randomly selected from the antenatal clinic of Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Zaria. Serum TALP activity was measured using the 4-Nitrophenylphosphate (4-NPP) method. Sociodemographic and obstetrics characteristics were obtained using an administered questionnaire. Microsoft Excel (Microsoft offi ce, 2003) was used for data analysis. Distributions of ALP activities were found to be skewed; hence, non-parametric analyses using percentiles were used in measuring the variation. A P-value of equal to or less than 0.05 (P ≤ 0.05) was considered as statistically signifi cant. Results: The serum TALP activity in normal 3 rd trimester pregnancy was found to be higher when compared to the normal population, with a gradual increase with advancing gestational age. Subjects in the gestational age group of 28 to 30 weeks had a serum TALP activity of 46-138 IU/L, with a continuous increase of up to 213 IU/L at 39 weeks of gestation. A sudden drop in activity was observed at the gestational age of 40 weeks and above. The overall serum TALP activity in normal 3 rd trimester pregnancy was found to be 41-206 IU/L. Conclusion: A higher serum TALP activity for normal 3 rd trimester pregnancy was confi rmed for this environment, as has been found elsewhere. There is the need to interpret serum TALP activity in pregnancy with caution.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.