New Ways to Deliver Hydrogen and Other Healing Gases to the Body
- Authors
- Wanjun Gong, Chao Xia, Qianjun He
- Journal
- Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Nanomedicine and Nanobiotechnology
- Year
- 2021
- DOI
- 10.1002/wnan.1744
- Study Type
- clinical
- Peer Reviewed
- Yes
- Country
- China
- Health Condition
- Inflammatory Diseases
- Body System
- Cardiovascular
TL;DR
Scientists discovered that certain gases like hydrogen can help treat diseases, but the tricky part is getting these gases to the right place in your body—so researchers are developing different delivery methods (like special containers and chemical reactions) to make gas therapy work better and actually help patients.
Key Finding
Hydrogen and other bioactive gases represent an emerging pharmaceutical approach with potential for treating multiple diseases, but effective delivery to target tissues remains the primary challenge in developing clinical gas therapies.
Summary
This review article examines how therapeutic gases—including hydrogen, hydrogen sulfide, and carbon monoxide—can be delivered to the body to treat diseases. The authors describe three main delivery approaches: directly absorbing gas molecules, using chemical compounds that release gas in the body, and using catalysts (substances that trigger chemical reactions) to generate gases where needed. While these gas-based therapies show promise, the biggest challenge is getting gas molecules to reach the right tissues effectively.
Practical Takeaway
This is a review article summarizing the state of gas therapy research rather than a clinical study testing hydrogen water in humans. It suggests hydrogen gas has therapeutic potential, but the review does not evaluate hydrogen water specifically or provide evidence about its effectiveness or safety in people. More targeted human studies would be needed to assess whether hydrogen water offers health benefits.
Abstract
Gas molecules with pharmaceutical effects offer emerging solutions to diseases. In addition to traditional medical gases including O2 and NO, more gases such as H2 , H2 S, SO2 , and CO have recently been discovered to play important roles in various diseases. Though some issues need to be addressed before clinical application, the increasing attention to gas therapy clearly indicates the potentials of these gases for disease treatment. The most important and difficult part of developing gas therapy systems is to transport gas molecules of high diffusibility and penetrability to interesting targets. Given the particular importance of gas molecule delivery for gas therapy, distinguished strategies have been explored to improve gas delivery efficiency and controllable gas release. Here, we summarize the strategies of therapeutic gas delivery for gas therapy, including direct gas molecule delivery by chemical and physical absorption, inorganic/organic/hybrid gas prodrugs, and natural/artificial/hybrid catalyst delivery for gas generation. The advantages and shortcomings of these gas delivery strategies are analyzed. On this basis, intelligent gas delivery strategies and catalysts use in future gas therapy are discussed. This article is categorized under: Therapeutic Approaches and Drug Discovery > Emerging Technologies Therapeutic Approaches and Drug Discovery > Nanomedicine for Oncologic Disease.