Ineffectiveness of folic acid supplementation against phenytoin-induced decrease in salivary immunoglobulin A concentration of epileptic patients.
OBJECTIVE
This study was designed to investigate if folate treatment is able to reverse the phenytoin-induced deficiency of salivary immunoglobulin A (IgA).


METHODS
Twenty-five epileptic patients who had been under phenytoin therapy for at least the last 6 months were randomly selected and subjected to folic acid supplementation, 1 mg/day. The salivary IgA concentration of these patients was measured before and after 2 months of folic acid administration and compared with those of 10 healthy individuals. Independent and paired Student's t tests were used to analyze the effects of phenytoin and folic acid, respectively.


RESULTS
Salivary IgA levels of patients receiving phenytoin (11.7 +/- 4.8 IU/l) were significantly (p = 0.039) lower than those of healthy controls (14.8 +/- 3.2 IU/l), but did not statistically (p = 0.541) differ from levels (11.8 +/- 4.6 IU/l) measured after 2 months of folic acid supplementation.


CONCLUSIONS
According to these results, folic acid supplementation does not seem to have the efficacy to ameliorate phenytoin-induced salivary IgA hyposecretion.
Zare
Mohammad
M
Department of Neurology, Faculty of Medicine, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
Ghazvini
Mohammad Reza Aghaye
MR
Yazdi
Hamid Reza Barkhordari
HR
Nezhad
Vahid Shayegan
VS
Chitsaz
Ahmad
A
D019587:Dietary Supplements; D004827:Epilepsy / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000276:immunology*; D005260:Female; D005492:Folic Acid / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D006801:Humans; D017098:IgA Deficiency / Q000139:chemically induced / Q000276:immunology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010672:Phenytoin / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000494:pharmacology; D012463:Saliva / Q000276:immunology*; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D010672:Phenytoin; D005492:Folic Acid