Hydrogen Shows Promise as Medical Therapy for Multiple Conditions
- Authors
- Jing-Yao Zhang, Chang Liu, Lei Zhou, Kai Qu, Ruitao Wang, Ming-Hui Tai, Ji-Chao Wei Lei Lei, Qi Fei Wu, Zhi-Xin Wang
- Journal
- Hepatogastroenterology
- Year
- 2012
- DOI
- 10.5754/hge11883
- Study Type
- clinical
- Peer Reviewed
- Yes
- Country
- China
- Health Condition
- Oxidative Stress
- Body System
- Cellular
TL;DR
Scientists found that hydrogen gas might be a really cool new medicine that can help protect your cells and reduce inflammation and damage in your body. The good news is it's easy to use—you can breathe it in, drink it in water, or get it injected—but doctors still need to do more research to figure out exactly how it works and when to use it best.
Key Finding
Multiple delivery methods for hydrogen—including inhalation, hydrogen-dissolved water, and hydrogen-saturated saline—have been shown to be practical and available for clinical use in recent studies.
Summary
This is a review article that summarizes recent research on hydrogen as a medical treatment. Studies have shown that hydrogen may help protect cells and organs by reducing harmful inflammation, fighting oxidative stress (cellular damage from unstable molecules), and preventing cell death. Researchers have tested different ways to deliver hydrogen to the body, including breathing it in, drinking hydrogen-enriched water, and injecting hydrogen-saturated salt solution. However, the review notes that many questions remain unanswered and more research is needed.
Practical Takeaway
While this review suggests hydrogen shows promise as a therapeutic agent with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, it is a summary of existing research rather than a new study with specific results. The authors themselves emphasize that significant questions remain and much more work is needed before hydrogen's role in medical treatment can be fully understood. Anyone considering hydrogen water should be aware that the evidence base is still developing.
Abstract
In the past few years many initial and subsequent clinical studies have demonstrated that hydrogen can act as an important physiological regulatory factor to cells and organs on the antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-apoptotic and other protective effects. So far several delivery methods applied in these studies have proved to be available and convenient, including inhalation, drinking hydrogen-dissolved water and injection with hydrogen-saturated saline. This study reviews recent studies on the protectiveness of hydrogen and discusses the possible mechanisms including antioxidant ability as a gaseous signaling molecule, anti-cancer capability and others. It also tries to reveal whether endogenous hydrogen has an important role in the protective system. Nevertheless, there are still many remaining questions in the domain of hydrogen medicine and much work needs to be carried out in the future.