Background:
Acute leukemia is the most frequent childhood cancer. Breast milk as the best nutrition for baby known has antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory and immune modulatory components for preventing the occurrence of childhood infection and malignancies a well.
Aim:
To analyze the correlation between the history of breastfeeding and the incidence of acute childhood leukemia (Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) and Acute Myelocytic Lekemia(AML) in Semarang Indonesia.
Methods:
A case control study involving acute leukemia patients aged 1-14 year-old at Kariadi Hospital Semarang in 2013 until April 2014. The control group was age and gender matched healthy children. The parents were interviewed about breastfeeding history including duration, tipe of breastfeeding and exclusive breastfeed. Data about familial malignancy, maternal radiation, infection and alcoholism were collected using a questionnaire. Exclusive breastfeeding defined as the baby had breastmilk only until 4-6 month. Statistical analysis used were logistic regression and Mann Whitney
Results:
In total107 patients involved whereas ALL 85 patients (79.4%), AML 21 patients (19.6%) and mixed leukemia 1 (0.9%). Exclusive breastfeeding was more frequently found in healthy children than in lekemic (74.76% vs 53.27%), OR 0.385, 95% CI(0.21-0.68)p 0.001. The median of breasfeeding duration was longer in healthy children 12.27 month (IQR 3-24) than lekemic 1.5(IQR 1-8) p=<0.01 . By used regression analysis showed OR and 95%CI for familial malignancy1.95(0.4-2.06)p0.16, infection 0.58(0.11-6.36)p0.88 and alcoholism 0.0 (0.0)p0.99 respectively.
Conclusions:
Exclusive breastfeeding is protective factor for acute leukemia. Acute leukemia patients had breasfeeding shorter than healthy children. Familial malignancy,maternal radiation,infection and alcoholism were not the risk factors for acute leukemia.