CHROMOSOMAL-ABNORMALITIES IN SPERM FROM TESTICULAR CANCER-PATIENTS BEFORE AND AFTER CHEMOTHERAPY

Sperm chromosome abnormalities were assessed in testicular cancer pati ents before and after treatment with BEP (bleomycin, etoposide, cispla tin). The frequencies of disomy for chromosomes 1, 12, X, Y and XY wer e assessed along with diploid frequencies and sex ratios by multicolou r fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH). For each cancer patient, a minimum of 10000 sperm was assessed for each chromosome probe before and after chemotherapy (CT). Data was analysed ''blindly'' by coding the slides. A total of 161097 sperm were analyzed, 80445 before and 80 642 after treatment. The mean disomy frequencies were 0.11% pre-CT vs 0.06% post-CT for chromosome 1, 0.18% vs 0.15% for chromosome 12, 0.10 % vs 0.9% for the X chromosome, 0.13% vs 0.10% for the Y chromosome ad d 0.25% vs 0.20% for XY sperm. There was no significant difference in the frequency of disomy pre-CT vs post-CT for any chromosome except th at chromosome 1 demonstrated a significant decrease after CT. The ''se x ratios'' and frequency of diploid sperm were also not significantly different in pre- and post-CT samples with 50.2% X-bearing sperm pre-C T and 50.5% X post-CT and 0.14% diploid sperm pre-CT vs 0.15% diploid sperm post-CT. There was no significant donor heterogeneity among the cancer patients. None of the values in the cancer patients differed si gnificantly from 10 normal control donors. Thus our study suggests tha t BEP chemotherapy does not increase the risk of numerical chromosomal abnormalities in human sperm.