The clinical effect of dietary supplementation with omega-3 fish oils and/or copper in systemic lupus erythematosus

What Was Tested

Researchers studied Copper (Supplement) in the context of lupus (sle) in this randomized controlled trial publication.

To determine the effect of dietary supplementation with omega-3 fish oils with or without copper on disease activity in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE).

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 52 patients taking part.

By PubMed's age tags, the people studied were adults, middle-aged adults and older adults, both men and women.

A double blind, double placebo controlled factorial trial was performed on 52 patients with SLE.

Patients were randomly assigned to 4 treatment groups.

How the Study Was Run

The researchers set it up as a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Copper (Supplement) and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

Neither the patients nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Copper (Supplement), so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

Some patients received a placebo instead of Copper (Supplement), giving a reference point.

Serial measurements of disease activity using the revised Systemic Lupus Activity Measure (SLAM-R) and peripheral blood samples for routine hematological, biochemical, and immunological indices were taken at baseline, 6, 12, and 24 weeks.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Copper, Dietary Supplements, Fatty Acids, Omega-3, Fish Oils, Lupus Erythematosus, Systemic and Patient Compliance.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Copper (Supplement) in 52 patients in people with lupus (sle).

Its findings take up roughly 4 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2004 (The Journal of rheumatology), a journal based in Canada.

More context: the Copper (Supplement) compound page, Lupus (SLE) research.