The measurement of ferritin in the leukemic blasts with a "sandwich" type enzyme immunoassay method

The concentration of ferritin in serum and leukemic blasts were measured with the improved method of enzyme immunoassay for ferritin which uses beta-D-galactosidase from Escherichia coli. Precise measurement of ferritin was possible for concentration as low as 0.2 ng/ml serum. A good correlation (correlation coefficient, 0.946) existed between the ferritin radioimmunoassay and enzyme immunoassay. The serum ferritin levels in healthy males were 97.2 +/- 46.7 ng/ml, whereas those in healthy females were 53.5 +/- 27.1 ng/ml. Serum ferritin level was markedly increased (698 +/- 447 ng/ml) in sera of 36 patients with various types of acute leukemia, of which acute monocytic leukemia showed the highest serum ferritin concentrations (1156 +/- 324 ng/ml). Leukemic blasts from 24 patients with acute leukemia contained markedly elevated concentrations of ferritin (64.3 +/- 38.7 ng/10(6) cells) as compared with the ferritin concentration in normal leukocytes (7.1 +/- 2.8 ng/10(6) cells). The blasts cells from the patients with acute monocytic leukemia showed the highest ferritin levels (105 +/- 26.6 ng/10(6) cells).