Determination of silver and cerium in the liver and the kidney from a severely burned infant treated with silver sulfadiazine and cerium nitrate

Silver and cerium in the liver and the kidney from severely burned infant were analyzed by neutron activation method. The patient was treated topically with cerium nitrate/silver sulfadiazine cream and cerium nitrate solution for 3 months. Then, the treatment with these drugs was stopped because o f abdominal distention. The patient died 1 month after the cessation of the treatment with these drugs. The tissue specimens, blank liver sample and reference standards were irradiated with TRIGA MARK II Reactor of Rikkyo University. About 1 month after the irradiation, the activities were measured with a Ge(Li) detector coupled to a 4096 channel pulse height analyzer. A large amount of silver was detected both in the liver and in the kidney and a trace of cerium only in the liver. A considerable amount of silver was detected in the liver and its quantity was about 1600 times more than that of normal livers reported by Hamilton, Minski and Cleary (1972 -- 73). Neither silver nor cerium were detected in the blank liver. These results suggest that prolonged topical chemotherapy of cerium nitrate/silver sulfadiazine cream and cerium nitrate solution for the extensive burn injuries causes considerable absorption of silver and cerium into the liver and the kidney. (author)