Aamer Naseer, Humayun Iqbal Khan, Mohammad Ali Khan, Fauzia Aamer.
Spectrum of complications of chemotherapy in children.
Pak Paed J Jan ;33(2):108-14.

Objectives: To study various complications of chemotherapy and their frequency in children suffering from cancer during first 6 months of treatment. Study Design: A descriptive case series. Place and Duration of Study: This study was carried out in the oncology sections of the department of pediatrics, Children Hospital, Lahore and Mayo Hospital, Lahore. Duration of this study was 1 year from 01/01/2003 – 01/01/2004. Method: A total of 50 patients were included in this study. Complications of chemotherapy were observed on the basis of history, physical examination and various investigations after taking informed consent from the parents of the patients. The data were collected on a proforma and analyzed using SPSS for Windows version 8. The results were compared with other studies. Chi-Squares test was applied to determine P-values. Results: Fever was noticed in 40 (80%) patients followed by nausea and vomiting in 36 (72%). On physical examination alopecia was seen in 28 (56%), thrombophilitis in 26 (56%) and skin bleed in 16 (32%) cases. Laboratory analysis revealed thrombocytopenia and neutropenia in 30 (60%) patients each and anemia in 28 (56%) patients. Biochemical abnormalities showed hyponatremia in 16 (32) and hyperkalemia in 8 (16%) cases. Five patients (10%) developed culture proven sepsis. Conclusion: Fever, nausea, vomiting, alopecia, thrombocytopenia, anemia, neutropenia, thrombocytopenia were the frequent complications observed in our study.

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