[Effect of treatment with a food supplement (containing: selected sea fish cartilage, vitamin C, vitamin E, folic acid, zinc, copper) in women with iron deficiency: double blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial]

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial looks at Copper (Supplement).

This clinical situation is very frequent in patients in fertile age.

The therapy commonly used (Fe salts) is often poorly tolerated.

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 49 women taking part.

The age groups tagged for this paper are adults, women only.

The present study examines 49 fertile women with iron deficiency, of normal weight and not undergoing estroprogestin treatment.

Following the basal assessment, patients were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 treatment groups: treatment A (25 patients): food supplement containing hydrolyzed sea fish cartilage, vitamin C, vitamin E, folic acid, zinc, copper (Captafer); treatment B (24 patients): placebo.

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 women nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Copper (Supplement), so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

The comparison arm used a placebo, so changes seen with Copper (Supplement) could be set against what happens without it.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Ascorbic Acid, Cartilage, Copper, Dietary Supplements, Fishes, Folic Acid and Iron.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Copper (Supplement) in 49 women.

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 2006 (Minerva medica), a journal based in Italy.

More context: the Copper (Supplement) compound page, all human trials.