Abstract :
Introduction: Pregnant women undergo various hormonal and metabolic adaptations. The focus of the
present study was to assess various biochemical parameters including serum copper in the second or third
trimester pregnant women. It is a cross sectional study carried out at a tertiary care center i.e. SMIMER,
Surat, India.
Material and Methods: 2nd trimester and 3rd trimester pregnant women were included in this study and
compared with age matched apparently healthy women. Women with history of smoking, alcohol/tobacco
addiction, liver disease, chronic renal failure, diabetes mellitus, hypertension and endocrine disorders were
excluded from the study. After informed consent, blood samples were collected. Analysis of various
biochemical parameters including copper were analyzed and data was analyzed.
Results: Significantly lower level of urea, creatinine, albumin, total protein, total bilirubin, alanine
aminotransferase & aspartate aminotransferase activity in pregnant subjects compared to control was
observed. Significantly increased dyslipidemia was observed in pregnant women compared to controls.
Significantly higher levels of serum copper were observed in 3 trimester followed by 2 trimester compared
to controls. This happened irrespective of age and gravida status.
Conclusion: As expected lower levels of various biochemical parameters were found in pregnant women
compared to controls due to hemodilution. Important finding of this study is the dyslipidemia observed in
pregnant women which may be attributed to hormonal and metabolic changes. There was an increasing
pattern in the levels of serum copper as the pregnancy progresses but pattern exists in a population needs
to be explored.
Keyword :
Copper pregnancy, Biochemical parameters, Atomic absorption spectrometry, Trimester.