Glutathione (γ-glutamyl-cysteinylglycine) occurs in several forms in human body. The most important forms are reduced (GSH) and oxidized (GSSG) glutathione. It plays a lot of useful functions in human body and it is one of most important antioxidants.

            Characteristic element of glutathione structure is thiol group (-SH) which is responsible for biological functions of this compound. GSH protects organism against reactive forms of oxygen (hydrogen peroxide, organic peroxides), egzogenous  endogenous electrophilic substances and also oxidized forms of other antioxidants for example vit. E or C. Glutathione is also presented in specific selenoenzym-glutathione peroxidase protecting organism from hydrogen peroxide and lipid peroxides. GSH antioxidative activity appears also in reduction of thiol group of different amino acids and protect them from oxidation to sulfonic or sulfinic acids and losing their activities.

            GSH presents also immunomodulatory effect. This compound participates in cytokine production and humoral immune response and cell-mediated response by antigen presentation to T lymphocytes. It also has an influence on proliferation of lymphocytes and endothelial cells, increases cytotoxic lymphocytes T, granulocytes and natural killers cells activity. Even a small aberration in glutathione content may lead to lymphocyte T cells dysfunction.

            Huge meaning of this compound highlights the fact, that it is synthesized in all body cells as necessary to cover high demand for this compound. If not the glutathione, the body would not be able to protect itself against infections and cancer development, the liver would not have any ability to detoxify heavy metals, toxins, xenobiotics and cells would be subject of continuous destruction. Thus measuring both forms of this peptide seems to be interesting in investigating oxidative/antioxidative status in various physiological and pathophysiological conditions.Despite the fact, the impact of glutathione in various physiological processes is well known, there are still no specific reports concerning the purposefulness and effectiveness of supplementation this substance.

            The most popular modulators of glutathione content are: glutathione esters, amino acids (cysteine, glutamine), their analogues: S-adenosylmethionine, N-acetylcysteine and a lot of other substances such as: vitaminum C and E, silymarin, α-lipoic acid, melatonine, whey protein.  

The objective of the study was to agree whether crenotherapy (drinking therapy) with sulfide/hydrogen sulfide (SHS) waters from “Zuzanna” spring located in the area of Busko-Zdrój leads to increasing of glutathione (GSH and GSSG) content in human blood. Crenotherapy is a branch of balneotherapy – the method generally applied to everything relating to spa treatment, including the drinking of waters and the use of hot baths and natural vapor baths, as well as of the various kinds of gases or peloids such as: mud, sand used for hot applications.

 SHS water in distinct from mineral water is characterised by specific pharmacokinetic, invariable content and natural microbiological purity. SHS waters contain at least 1 g of total sulfur per kilogram of water and a treatment effect also depends on other bioelements.

A lot of earlier experiments confirmed positive influence of H₂S on antioxidative properties of organism. The fact, that H₂S takes part in many important processes in human body is obvious, because even the one of the first organisms on the earth-cyanobacteria use it in anaerobic photosytntesis.

In vivo H₂S is synthetized by the pyridoxal phosphate dependent enzymes cystathionine-γ-lyase, cystathionine b-synthase and 3-mercaptopyruvate sulfurtransferase utilizing the amino acids l-cysteine,l-homocysteine and l-cystathionine. SHS water is used in rheumatology to treat: rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, gouty arthritis and other disorders of muscles and bandapparat, in post-traumatic and post-operative disorders of locomotor.

In this study GSH and GSSG ratio were analyzed in whole blood. The group of 40 volunteers consisted of both women and men, in different age range. Volunteers were either non-responsive, intolerant, or had a contraindication to crenotherapy.

            The therapy with SHS waters lasted 2 weeks. We recently demonstrated that the administration of H₂S in SHS waters increases GSH concentration in blood, and therefore crenotherapy could be used in therapeutics. Increase of GSH concentration is a parameter of improvement of health in patients which take part in experiment and it has an influence on immune system and antioxidative activity. The subjective wellbeing of patients was also observed.

 The method employing capillary electrophoresis with UV detector for the analysis of glutathione in human blood was developed.

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