Patients with allergic and irritant contact dermatitis are characterized by striking change of iron and oxidized glutathione status in nonlesional area of the skin

To assess the consequences of oxidative stress in allergic and irritant con tact dermatitis, we compared the iron level, unsaturated iron-binding capac ity, total iron binding capacity, the percentage saturation of iron-binding capacity, the amount of diene conjugates as well as the amounts of total g lutathione, reduced glutathione, oxidized glutathione, and the oxidized glu tathione/reduced glutathione ratio in skin homogenate from lesional and non lesional skin. Lesional skin samples were obtained from positive patch test sites to 5% NiSO4 in five subjects, and from chronic contact dermatitis le sions on the hands, which had exacerbated over 3-9 wk in six subjects. Cont act dermatitis caused at least a 4-fold increase in the iron level in the l esional skin area compared with the nonlesional skin area (p < 0.02). The i ncrease in the iron level depended on the duration of contact dermatitis an d was accompanied by high unsaturated iron-binding capacity and total iron- binding capacity values in the positive patch test sites (p <0.05), and by a high percentage saturation value in the chronic contact dermatitis lesion s (p < 0.05). We found high indices for iron, total iron-binding capacity a nd diene conjugates in the apparently healthy skin of the patients with per sistent contact dermatitis that significantly (p < 0.05) exceeded the corre sponding values in the patients with only patch test reactions. In summary, we have succeeded in providing evidence that generalized oxidative damage of the skin occurs as a consequence of contact dermatitis in a restricted a rea.