title: Redox status expressed as GSH:GSSG ratio as a marker for oxidative stress in paediatric tumour patients.
abstract: Oxidative stress causes profound alterations of various biological structures, including cellular membranes, lipids, proteins and nucleic acids, and it is involved in numerous malignancies. Reduced glutathione (GSH) is considered to be one of the most important scavengers of reactive oxygen species (ROS), and its ratio with oxidised glutathione (GSSG) may be used as a marker of oxidative stress. The main aim of this study was to determine GSH:GSSG ratio in the blood serum of paediatric cancer patients to use this ratio as a potential marker of oxidative stress. The whole procedure was optimised and the recoveries for both substances were greater than 80% under the optimised conditions. We analysed a group of paediatric patients (n=116) with various types of cancer, including neuroblastoma, anaplastic ependymoma, germ cell tumour, genital tract tumour, lymphadenopathy, rhabdomyosarcoma, nephroblastoma, Ewing's sarcoma, osteosarcoma, Hodgkin's lymphoma, medulloblastoma and retinoblastoma. We simultaneously determined the levels of reduced and oxidised glutathione, and thus, its ratio in the blood serum of the patients. The highest ratio was observed in retinoblastoma patients and the lowest in anaplastic ependymoma. We were able to distinguish between the diagnoses based on the results of the obtained GSH:GSSG ratio.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Faculty of Agronomy, Mendel University in Brno, Brno 61300;
authors.forename: Ondrej
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Zitka
authors.forename: Sylvie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Skalickova
authors.forename: Jaromir
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Gumulec
authors.forename: Michal
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Masarik
authors.forename: Vojtech
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Adam
authors.forename: Jaromir
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hubalek
authors.forename: Libuse
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Trnkova
authors.forename: Jarmila
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kruseova
authors.forename: Tomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Eckschlager
authors.forename: Rene
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kizek