REPRODUCIBILITY OF THE CHAMBER SCARIFICATION TEST

The chamber scarification test is a predictive human skin irritation t est developed to rank the irritation potential of products and ingredi ents meant for repeated use on normal and diseased skin. 12 products o r ingredients can be tested simultaneously on the forearm skin of each volunteer. The test combines with the procedure scratching of the ski n at each test site and subsequent closed patch tests with the product s, repeated daily for 3 days. The test is performed on groups of human volunteers: a skin irritant substance or products is included in each test as a positive control, and a compound with low irritant potentia l as a negative control, to obtain relative characterization of the ir ritant potential of the unknown products. The outcome of tests with a positive and negative control product used repeatedly in 13 chamber sc arification tests over a 7-year period is reported, and shows high rep roducibility of the test. Further, intra-individual variation in skin reaction to the 2 control products in 26 volunteers, who participated 2x, is shown, which supports the conclusion that the chamber scarifica tion test is a useful short-term human skin irritation test with high reproducibility.