Efficacy and safety of S-acyl glutathione 2% cream vs. placebo against UVB-induced erythema: a randomized, double-blinded clinical trial

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Glutathione, published as a randomized controlled trial.

Another secondary objective is the evaluation of safety in both conditions.

Why It Was Studied

Reactive oxygen species have a major role in the UV-induced short- and long-term damage, thus the exogenous supplementation of antioxidant molecules may allow better skin protection.

Despite glutathione has pivotal properties in the complex cytoplasmic antioxidant system, its supplementation is hampered by limited transmembrane absorption.

Who Took Part

According to the abstract, 10 volunteers were involved.

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

A secondary endpoint was the evaluation of the same cream applied after irradiation compared to no treatment.

Safety was evaluated reporting all grade 3-4 adverse events up to 30 days after treatment.

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 Glutathione and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

As a double-blind Glutathione study, the assignments were hidden from both participants and investigators until the end.

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

The methods mention a period of 30 days.

This was a single center randomized double-blinded clinical trial, versus placebo, cross-sectional pairwise at time 0.

Mean MED was evaluated at distinct conditions.

All volunteers were treated in all four experimental conditions.

The pre-Lin-GSH and placebo arms were applied in a double-blind condition for each volunteer.

Neither the volunteer nor the investigator executing MED evaluation knew which arm was given Lin-GSH and which one placebo.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Acetylation, Antioxidants, Cross-Sectional Studies, Erythema, Glutathione, Reactive Oxygen Species and Skin Cream.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Glutathione in 10 volunteers over 30 days.

With fewer than 40 people, it is a small study, so it is better read as an early signal for further research than as a settled answer.

Results are reported in around 6 sentences of the abstract; we leave them to the paper itself rather than summarise them.

The publication is from 2019 (Giornale italiano di dermatologia e venereologia : organo ufficiale, Societa italiana di dermatologia e sifilografia), a journal based in Italy.

More context: the Glutathione compound page, all human trials.