Young females with acute leukemia are not adequately screened for pregnancy before the initiation of a chemotherapy regimen, according to a new study published in the journal Cancer.
For the study, researchers analyzed data on 35,650 females aged 10 to 18 years collected from hospitals across the United States from 1999 to 2011. Examined cases included those with newly diagnosed acute lymphoblastic leukemia or acute myeloid leukemia and individuals who received a computed tomography scan of the abdomen or pelvis upon emergency room admission.
Analysis revealed 35 percent of the ALL cohort, 64 percent of the AML group and 58 percent of the ER cohort were properly screened for pregnancy prior to beginning chemotherapy or being administered a CT scan.
"We found that adolescent girls are not adequately screened for pregnancy prior to receiving chemotherapy or CT scans that could harm a developing fetus," said lead author Pooja Rao, MD, of the pediatric hematology-oncology department at Penn State Health's Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, Derry Township. "Since nearly all chemotherapy agents used for childhood [or] adolescent acute leukemia can cause potential harm to a developing fetus, our findings indicate a need for standardized pregnancy screening practices for adolescent patients being treated for cancer."
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