Journal of Indian Academy of Oral Medicine and Radiology (Jan 2005)
Estimation of Serum β-Carotene Levels in Oral Carcinoma
Abstract
Oral Cancer is one of the most frequent malignant conditions affecting mankind today. Evidence in support of chemopreventive role for antioxidant nutrients like β-carotene and vitamin E are available in plenty. Antioxidants serve to stabilise the highly reactive free radicals thereby maintaining the structural and functional integrity of cells. Antioxidants status of the body can be considerably influenced by the diet. β-carotene is a pro-vitamin A and must be supplied through diet. Foods rich in, β-carotene have been found to reduce the risk of cancer It is a potent antioxidant because it works effectively even at low oxygen pressure found in living cells and tissues. An approach to the discovery and use of biomarkers for determining the efficacy of nutrient antioxidants as chemopreventive agents is to assess there ability to modulate their proposed mechanism of action in animal and small human clinical trials and then to link these actions to disease out comes and pathologic biomarkers. Keeping this in mind the present study was undertaken to evaluate serum-carotene level in oral cancer patients & to compare with the normal control group. Serum -carotene level was estimated by spectrophotometric method. The present study showed low levels of serum β-carotene in patients with oral carcinoma.
