ANALYSIS OF CHROMOSOMAL-ABERRATIONS, SISTER-CHROMATID EXCHANGES AND MICRONUCLEI IN PERIPHERAL LYMPHOCYTES OF PHARMACISTS BEFORE AND AFTER WORKING WITH CYTOSTATIC DRUGS

The frequencies of chromosome aberrations, SCEs and micronuclei (cytok inesis-block method) in blood lymphocytes were compared among six nons moking female pharmacists before and after 1 year of working with cyto static drugs. All possible precautions were taken to avoid exposure to cytostatics, including proper protective clothing and a monitored, ne gative-pressured working environment with vertical laminar flow cabine t. As referents, an age-matched group of six nonsmoking female hospita l workers not dealing with cytostatics was simultaneously sampled twic e with the same time interval. The pharmacists showed a marginally hig her mean frequency of SCEs/cell (6.3; P = 0.049) after the working per iod than 1 year earlier (5.8). On the other hand, the referents, with no obvious exposure, had a higher mean number of cells with chromatid- type aberrations, gaps excluded, in the second sampling (2.0%; P=0.048 ) than in the first one (0.5%). In addition, a slight (P=0.055) trend towards a higher frequency of micronucleated binucleate cells was obse rved in the second sampling for both the exposed and control subjects. As such findings suggest technical variation in the cytogenetic param eters, the small difference observed in SCEs for the pharmacists betwe en the two samplings was probably not related to the cytostatics expos ure. No statistically significant differences were observed for any of the cytogenetic parameters in comparisons between the pharmacists and the referents. The findings suggest that caution should be exercised in comparing results obtained from two different samplings in prospect ive cytogenetic studies.