Potential benefits for healthcare workers and patients from using oat extract ingredients placed in the inner layer of nitrile gloves.

Nitrile gloves are cur­rent­ly an essen­tial and con­stant­ly used piece of equip­ment for health­care work­ers, pro­vid­ing a pro­tec­tive bar­ri­er against infec­tious agents dur­ing patient con­tact. How­ev­er, pro­longed wear­ing of gloves can lead to skin prob­lems for med­ical per­son­nel [11]. Oat extract con­tains many ingre­di­ents with poten­tial­ly ben­e­fi­cial effects on the skin, and incor­po­rat­ing them into the inner lay­er of nitrile gloves can offer a range of ben­e­fits for both health­care work­ers and patients. 

Benefits for healthcare workers 

Health­care work­ers often expe­ri­ence skin prob­lems such as dry­ness, cracks, irri­ta­tion, and itch­ing [11]. These con­di­tions can be caused by var­i­ous fac­tors, includ­ing: 

  • Pro­longed wear­ing of gloves, which caus­es the loss of the skin’s nat­ur­al mois­ture. 
  • Con­tact with deter­gents and dis­in­fec­tants. 
  • Fric­tion and pres­sure from the gloves. 
  • Mac­er­a­tion of the skin due to occlu­sion. 

Ingre­di­ents in oat extract can help pre­vent and alle­vi­ate these skin prob­lems: 

  • Avenan­thramides are polyphe­nols found in oats that exhib­it anti-inflam­ma­to­ry and anti-itch prop­er­ties [1, 10]. Clin­i­cal stud­ies have demon­strat­ed the effec­tive­ness of avenan­thramides in alle­vi­at­ing itch symp­toms asso­ci­at­ed with var­i­ous skin con­di­tions, such as atopic der­mati­tis and urticaria [10]. The mech­a­nism of action involves inhibit­ing the release of inflam­ma­to­ry medi­a­tors, such as his­t­a­mine, which con­tribute to itch­ing and skin inflam­ma­tion [1]. Incor­po­rat­ing avenan­thramides into the inner lay­er of nitrile gloves can help reduce itch­ing and skin irri­ta­tion for health­care work­ers who fre­quent­ly expe­ri­ence these issues.
  • Beta-glu­can is a poly­sac­cha­ride with mois­tur­iz­ing, sooth­ing, and skin-regen­er­at­ing prop­er­ties [8, 9]. Beta-glu­can forms a pro­tec­tive lay­er on the skin, pre­vent­ing mois­ture loss and pro­mot­ing prop­er hydra­tion [8]. Addi­tion­al­ly, beta-glu­can stim­u­lates the pro­duc­tion of col­la­gen and elastin, which are essen­tial for main­tain­ing skin firm­ness and elas­tic­i­ty [9]. Incor­po­rat­ing beta-glu­can into nitrile gloves can help pre­vent skin dry­ness and crack­ing, as well as sup­port skin regen­er­a­tion after minor dam­age.
  • Fat­ty acids and vit­a­mins that nour­ish and pro­tect the skin [11]. Omega‑3 and omega‑6 fat­ty acids help main­tain the skin’s prop­er hydrolipid bar­ri­er, which pro­tects it from dry­ing out and irri­tat­ing fac­tors [14]. B vit­a­mins, vit­a­min E, and antiox­i­dants present in oat oil fur­ther nour­ish the skin and pro­tect it from the harm­ful effects of free rad­i­cals [11, 13]. Incor­po­rat­ing these ingre­di­ents into the inner lay­er of nitrile gloves can help improve the over­all con­di­tion of health­care work­ers’ hand skin.

Enhancement of the skin’s antioxidant protection 

The skin of health­care work­ers is exposed to var­i­ous stress fac­tors, both relat­ed to the work envi­ron­ment, such as dis­in­fec­tants and deter­gents, and those affect­ing the gen­er­al pop­u­la­tion, such as nat­ur­al UV radi­a­tion, which is part of the solar light spec­trum. These fac­tors con­tribute to the for­ma­tion of free rad­i­cals that dam­age skin cells and accel­er­ate the aging process. Oat extract is rich in antiox­i­dants, such as: 

  • Fer­ulic acid [2] 
  • p‑Coumaric acid [2] 
  • Vit­a­min E [11] 

Antiox­i­dants neu­tral­ize free rad­i­cals, pro­tect­ing skin cells from dam­age and slow­ing down the aging process [5, 6, 7]. In vit­ro stud­ies have shown that antiox­i­dants from oats can pro­tect skin cells from oxida­tive dam­age caused by UV radi­a­tion [4]. Incor­po­rat­ing oat extract into nitrile gloves can pro­vide addi­tion­al antiox­i­dant pro­tec­tion for the hands of health­care work­ers, which may help pre­vent pre­ma­ture skin aging and wrin­kles. 

Supporting wound healing 

Beta-glu­can found in oats has the abil­i­ty to stim­u­late the pro­duc­tion of col­la­gen and elastin, which are essen­tial for wound heal­ing [9]. Addi­tion­al­ly, beta-glu­can can also reduce inflam­ma­tion and form a pro­tec­tive lay­er over the wound, shield­ing it from infec­tions [9]. Clin­i­cal stud­ies have shown that the use of beta-glu­can can accel­er­ate wound heal­ing in indi­vid­u­als with var­i­ous types of wounds, includ­ing patients with dia­betes [9]. Incor­po­rat­ing beta-glu­can into nitrile gloves can be ben­e­fi­cial for health­care work­ers who often expe­ri­ence minor cuts or abra­sions dur­ing their work. 

Benefits for patients 

In addi­tion to ben­e­fits for med­ical per­son­nel, using nitrile gloves with added oat extract can also have pos­i­tive effects for patients. A sig­nif­i­cant aspect here is the increased pro­tec­tion against infec­tions: beta-glu­can, present in oats, exhibits antibac­te­r­i­al and antivi­ral prop­er­ties. It is also impor­tant to high­light that strength­en­ing the skin bar­ri­er can sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduce the risk of col­o­niza­tion, espe­cial­ly by mul­tidrug-resis­tant bac­te­ria. There­fore, not only do the direct antimi­cro­bial prop­er­ties mat­ter, but also main­tain­ing healthy skin can low­er the risk of cross-infec­tions trans­mit­ted through hand con­tact by staff with the patients’ bod­ies or their imme­di­ate envi­ron­ment. 

Safety and feasibility 

Clin­i­cal and tox­i­co­log­i­cal stud­ies have shown that oat extract is safe for use on the skin [12, 18]. Oat com­po­nents are well-tol­er­at­ed and rarely cause adverse effects [12]. 

Thanks to advance­ments in glove man­u­fac­tur­ing tech­nol­o­gy, it is pos­si­ble to incor­po­rate oat extract com­po­nents into the inner lay­er of nitrile gloves with­out the risk of los­ing their activ­i­ty.  

Conclusions 

Incor­po­rat­ing oat extract com­po­nents into the inner lay­er of nitrile gloves presents a promis­ing strat­e­gy to improve the skin health of health­care work­ers and enhance patient safe­ty. Fur­ther research is need­ed to eval­u­ate the effec­tive­ness and safe­ty of these gloves in clin­i­cal set­tings. 

Bib­li­og­ra­phy: 

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  1. Collins, F. W. (1989). Oat Phe­no­lics: Avenan­thramides, Nov­el Sub­stances with Antiox­i­dant Prop­er­ties. Cere­al Chem­istry, 66(4), 244–247. 
  1. Dim­berg, L. H., The­an­der, O., & Lingn­ert, H. (1993). Ave­nacins and Avenan­thramides in Oat Grains. Cere­al Chem­istry, 70(2), 157–160. 
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  1. Pil­lai, R., Red­mond, M., & Röd­ing, J. (2005). Anti-Wrin­kle Ther­a­py: Sig­nif­i­cant New Find­ings in the Non-Inva­sive Cos­met­ic Treat­ment of Skin Wrin­kles with Beta-Glu­can. Inter­na­tion­al Jour­nal of Cos­met­ic Sci­ence, 27(5), 292–292. [usunię­to niepraw­idłowy URL] 
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