Allergic contact dermatitis from a dish-washing liquid containing lauryl ether sulphate.

In Norway there occurred in 1966 an outbreak of severe allergic contact dermatitis in women who had used a new dish-washing agent. In connection with the dermatitis some of the patients also had systemic symptoms in the form of headache, nausea, fever and a certain degree of depression. The results of testing of patients and of sensitization tests in guinea pigs clearly showed that the cause of the dermatitis was in the lauryl ether sulphate component of the product. The results of testing of a sensitized factory worker and of guinea pigs with the unsulphated matter of LES 13-2035 and with extract of synthetic laurvl alcohol may suggest that the allergen is neither chemically bound to the lauryl ether sulphate molecule nor present in the actual raw product, fatty alcohol. Two outbreaks of allergic contact dermatitis fromproducts containing lauryl ether sulphate have since occurred elsewhere in Scandinavia. Work is in progress at various laboratories to identify the allergen and to trace its source and how to prevent its formation. Alkyl ether sulphates (~ alkyl ethoxy sulphates, AES) are important anionic surfactants that have been widely used for nearly 20 years in dishwashing liquids, shampoo mixtures, foam-bath agents, cosmetics and car cleaners. In Sweden the consumption of alkyl ether sulphates (containing various amounts of active matter) in commercially available products is at present about 3 000 tons a year (2). 1 In alkyl ether sulphates the alkyl group may vary in chain length, but the group with predominant-ly 12 carbon atoms is generally preferred for AES in shampoo mixtures and detergents. This alkyl group is usually reffered to as the lauryl group, for which reason the abreviation LES is used here for the corresponding ether sulphate. LES is produced from technical fatty alcohol. The fatty alcohol may be synthetic or “natural”, derived from, for example, coconut fat. The principal components of both are n-dodecyl and n-tetradecyl alcohol. The manufacture of ether sulphate from fatty alcohol is a three-stage procedure, namely first ethoxylation with ethylene oxide, then sulphation with e.g. sulphur trioxide, followed by neutralisation, usually with a solution of caustic soda (5). Some manufacturers finally bleach the product with a small amount of sodium hypochlorite or hydrogen peroxide. Due mainly to an incomplete sulphation reaction the technical product always contains a small percentage, counted on active matter, that is not LES. This matter is generally referred to as “unsulphated matter” and can be extracted from the LES by means of petroleum ether. The composition of technical LES thus dues not exactly correspond to chemically pure lauryl ether sulphate and may differ slightly between different brands and even between different batches of the same brand. In complete detergent formulae the ether sulphate may be the only surfactant, or one of several. Other common ingredients are inorganic salts, solvents, perfume and pigments. ALLERGIC CONTACT DERMATITIS FROM A DISH-WASHING LIQUID CONTAINING LAURYL ETHER SULPHATE Bertil Magnusson and Oscar Gilje 1 From the Department of Dermatology in Malmö, University of Lund, Sweden, and the Department of Dermatology, University of Oslo, Norway Oscar Gilje, M.D.. was Docent and Assistant Chief Physician at the Department of Dermatology, Rikshospitalet, Oslo. He died in November 1966. Manus till artikel över LES-epidemier i Skandinavien under 1966 till 1973. Formatredigerad 11 januari 2001 av BO. Senare publicerad i: Acta Derm Venereol. 1973;53(2):136-40