Nutritional Copper Deficiency in Severely Handicapped Patients on a Low Copper Enteral Diet for a Prolonged Period

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Abstract
Summary: Six cases of nutritional copper deficiency were identified in a nursery institute for severely handicapped patients. All had been on prolonged enteral feeding of a copper-deficient diet and all had abnormalities related to the copper deficiency. Two of them had leuko-penia, with or without macrocytic and normochromic anemia. After the oral administration of copper, the clinical and laboratory observations including neutrophil counts and serum copper and ceruloplasmin levels showed a complete recovery. The dietary copper requirement was estimated to be ∼20 μg/kg/day for these patients, based on the correlation between the dietary copper intake and the levels of copper in the serum.

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