Effect of zinc supplementation on serum antibody titers to heat shock protein 27 in patients with thalassemia major.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, published as a randomized controlled trial.

Objective This current study was conducted to determine the effect of zinc supplementation on antibody titers to heat shock protein 27 (anti-HSP27) in patients with beta-thalassemia major (β-TM).

Why It Was Studied

Methods This was a double-blinded placebo-controlled clinical trial conducted at Dr Sheikh Hospital (Mashhad, Iran) from 2011 to 2012.

Sixty-four patients (41 females and 23 males), aged between 8 and 18 years with transfusion-dependent β-TM were randomly allocated to two age- and sex-matched groups.

Who Took Part

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

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

Neither the participants nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

Some participants received a placebo instead of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, giving a reference point.

Serum anti-HSP27 titers were measured at the third and ninth months of the trial, using an in-house enzyme-linked immune-absorbent assay.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Dietary Supplements, HSP27 Heat-Shock Proteins, Heat-Shock Proteins, Molecular Chaperones, Zinc and beta-Thalassemia.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc.

The publication is from 2014 (Hematology (Amsterdam, Netherlands)), a journal based in England.

More context: the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc compound page, all human trials.