Vitamin E supplement improves erythrocyte membrane fluidity of thalassemia: an ESR spin labeling study.

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial looks at Vitamin E.

To investigate erythrocyte membrane fluidity and the effect of vitamin E treatment in beta-thalassemia/Hemoglobin E patients by using spin labeling techniques.

To determine the effect of vitamin E on erythrocyte membrane fluidity, only the splenectomized patients were enrolled.

Why It Was Studied

Beta-thalassemia/Hemoglobin E (beta-thal/Hb E) is prevalent in Thailand.

The imbalance of globin chains in red blood cells is the primary cause of this anemic disease.

Who Took Part

The age groups tagged for this paper are adults, both men and women.

The erythrocyte membrane fluidity was investigated in nine splenectomized and five non-splenectomized beta-thalassemia/hemoglobin E (beta-thal/Hb E) patients using EPR spin labeling techniques.

Patients were divided into two groups.

How the Study Was Run

The design is described as randomized and placebo-controlled.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Vitamin E and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the Vitamin E group a baseline to be compared against.

Three paramagnetic fatty acid, 5-, 12-, and 16-doxyl stearic acids, (5-, 12- and 16-DS) were used to label phospholipids layer near both the surface (5-DS) and the deeper hydrophobic region of membrane (12-and 16-DS).

Lipid peroxidation (TBARs) was measured using a colorimetric method.

Vitamin E was measured with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC).

What Was Measured

The imbalance of globin chains in red blood cells is the primary cause of this anemic disease.

PubMed files the paper under topics including Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid, Electron Spin Resonance Spectroscopy, Erythrocyte Membrane, Lipid Bilayers, Lipid Peroxidation, Membrane Fluidity and Spin Labels.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized and placebo-controlled study of Vitamin E.

Its findings take up roughly 8 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2012 (Journal of the Medical Association of Thailand = Chotmaihet thangphaet), a journal based in Thailand.

More context: all human trials.