Antipyrine metabolism in lung cancer patients and their relatives.

The existence of large interindividual differences in oxidation phenotypes and link of them with susceptibility to certain cancers was shown in animal and human studies. In a new approach plasma antipyrine half-lives have been measured in 60 lung cancer patients, 56 their first degree relatives and 75 healthy controls without cancer in their families. The mean antipyrine half-lives were significantly shorter (p < 0.005) in lung cancer patients group and in the group of their relatives when compared with the cancer free matched control group. This difference remained significant after adjusting for smoking gender and age. Six adenocarcinoma patients have shown significantly faster antipyrine metabolism than subjects with other histological types of lung cancer and obviously than healthy control.