Determination of Selenium Content in Serum normal blood pressure and preeclamptic and in the umbilical cord of their babies

Abstract

The arterial hypertension is an event associated to 10 % of the pregnancies. The preeclampsia or toxemia
are an illness that constitutes one of the main causes of death related to the pregnancy that is manifested as arterial
hypertension besides, retention of liquids and protein in the urine. Recent investigations have established relationship
between the selenium content and the resulting illnesses of the arterial hypertension. The selenium deficiency is
associated to low concentrations of this metal in blood and to a reduced activity of the enzyme glutathione peroxidase
The objective of this study was the determination of the selenium contents in blood of pregnant normotensivas (control
group) and pregnant with preeclampsia (study group) and of the umbilical cord of the recently born one, of the Infantile
Maternal Hospital “10 de Octubre”. The mothers were included with an arterial hypertension of unknown pathology. For
the determination of the selenium contents the spectrofluorometric method was used. The samples were treated previous
to the determination to be able to extract the selenium of the organic phase and to reduce the Se(VI) to Se(IV). The
test of normality of Shapiro-Wilks was applied and that of kindness of adjustment of Smirnov-Kolmogorov to know if the distribution of the data was normal.