You may have heard of glutathione before, and as one of the most powerful and important antioxidants in your body, it’s pretty essential to maintaining good health.
But the thing with antioxidants is that your body is constantly subjected to factors that deplete them—smoking, alcohol, food chemicals, environmental pollutants, and the list goes on.
So, in order to keep your body running smoothly, it’s critical to replace these key nutrients to keep a lock on your cellular health.
And when you supplement with glutathione, the promises are pretty intriguing: better energy, increased stamina, improved body detoxification, and even brighter skin. What’s not to love about that?
In any case, if you’re diving into the amazing world of glutathione but aren’t sure what to expect, keep reading.
We’ll outline what you need to know about how long you should supplement before you can expect to see results and other key ways to naturally support glutathione levels.
The Role Of Glutathione In The Body
Like we mentioned, glutathione is a powerful tripeptide composed of three amino acids—cysteine, glycine, and glutamine—that’s major role is as an antioxidant 1.
It is produced within the body and found in high concentrations in several tissues, playing key roles in various physiological processes involved in maintaining good health and preventing disease pathophysiology. Some of these include 1:
- Redox balance
- Reducing oxidative stress
- Supporting metabolic detoxification
- Regulating immune system function
While everyone’s body inherently produces it, a major influence on glutathione status is the degree of variability in an individual’s capacity to actually produce it, which primarily depends on genetic variability in the enzymes involved in its production and regeneration 1.
But also, when the body is subjected to high levels of oxidative stress, is malnourished, or experiencing increased toxic burden due to environmental contaminants, the need for glutathione increases, which means that GSH levels decline if not supported 2. And when levels become chronically low, some of the disease states you can run into include 3, 4:
- Premature aging (and aging in general)
- Neurodegenerative disorders
- Cancer
- Cognitive impairment
- Diabetes
- HIV/AIDS
- Autoimmunity
- Infertility
- Mental health disorders
- Hypertension
That doesn’t cover the full spectrum, but it gives you a pretty good idea of how important glutathione is, which means that if your body isn’t producing enough on its own, supplementing with it is key to maintaining health.
How Long Does Glutathione Take To Work?
Whether you’re taking a liposomal supplement or something like PL-Immune, where Setria Glutathione is one of six powerful compounds designed to support immune function, how long do you need to supplement before seeing results?
There’s no concrete answer to this one, as the effects are going to differ between individuals and largely depend on current glutathione status and health.
Lower GSH status will likely mean a more substantial period before you see improvements, whereas someone with a good GSH status may see improvements more quickly.
Some research suggests that in healthy adults, six months of oral glutathione supplementation at either 250mg/day or 1000 mg/day led to significant increases in body stores in a dose-dependent manner 5.
They also found that at six months, there was a marked decrease in oxidative stress evident through improvements in the oxidized (GSSG) to reduced (GSH) glutathione ratio, along with a favorable increase in natural killer cell activity.
Another small study found that either 500mg or 1000mg/day of liposomal glutathione for four weeks showed a trend towards increased glutathione levels in several tissues 6. However, this increase was not evident before two weeks.
Researchers also found improvements in the ratio of oxidized to reduced glutathione, with the most significant decreases occurring in the first two weeks of supplementation.
Similar to the other study, supplementation showed improvements in biomarkers for oxidative stress and improvements in immune markers like lymphocyte proliferation and natural killer cell activity.
Taken together, there’s really no set period to see results with glutathione supplementation, but based on available research, two weeks appears to be the minimum supplementation time before you can expect to see it working.
Other Ways To Support Glutathione Levels
Want to see improvements faster? Try optimizing glutathione production with key nutrients. Here are our top recommendations:
- N-Acetyl cysteine (NAC): Cysteine availability is the rate-limiting step in GSH production, so providing adequate building blocks ensures no interference with synthesis. Some research also points to NAC for mitigating some of the issues related to oxidative stress 7.
- Dietary protein: As the three precursors and foundation of glutathione production are amino acids, dietary protein intake may influence the amino acid pool that glutathione synthesis draws on 8. Studies suggest that changes to protein consumption may alter glutathione production and contribute to a decrease in antioxidant capacity.
- Omega-3 fatty acids: Chronic inflammation increases oxidative stress and can contribute to decreased glutathione levels 9. Because of their role in producing anti-inflammatory compounds, it’s suggested that supplementation with omega-3 fatty acids can help to support the maintenance of normal glutathione levels.
- Vitamins and minerals: Specific nutrients like the B vitamins, vitamins C and E, selenium, alpha-lipoic acid, and compounds found in cruciferous vegetables all contribute to improving oxidative stress levels, the formation and regeneration of glutathione, and antioxidant status in the body, which together help to maintain proper GSH levels.
Final Thoughts
Waiting for your supplements to work can seem like a forever thing, but the truth is that in most cases, they’re working behind the scenes to clean up inside before you actually see anything on the surface.
Generally speaking, a few weeks of supplementing is sufficient for you to start seeing some results, but if you want to reap maximum benefits, taking them daily is the most ideal.
And with the Performance Lab lineup, you’re getting the cleanest and most effective forms of every supplement that are designed for long-term use, so there’s no concern over how they’ll affect you months down the road—besides feeling amazing and seeing mind-blowing results.
References
- ch, BI Brown. A Review of Dietary (Phyto)Nutrients for Glutathione Support. 2019;11(9):2073.
- AL López-López, HB Jaime, MDC Escobar Villanueva, MB Padilla, GV Palacios, FJA Chronic unpredictable mild stress generates oxidative stress and systemic inflammation in rats.Physiol Behav. 2016;161:15-23.
- R Franco, OJ Schoneveld, A Pappa, MI Panayiotidis. The central role of glutathione in the pathophysiology of human diseases.Arch Physiol Biochem. 2007;113(4-5):234-258.
- N Ballatori, SM Krance, S Notenboom, S Shi, K Tieu, CL Hammond. Glutathione dysregulation and the etiology and progression of human diseases.Biol Chem. 2009;390(3):191-214.
- JP Richie Jr, S Nichenametla, W Neidig, et al. Randomized controlled trial of oral glutathione supplementation on body stores of glutathione. Eur J Nutr. 2015;54(2):251-263.
- R Sinha, I Sinha, A Calcagnotto, et al. Oral supplementation with liposomal glutathione elevates body stores of glutathione and markers of immune function.Eur J Clin Nutr. 2018;72(1):105-111.
- Q Zhang, Y Ju, Y Ma, T Wang. N-acetylcysteine improves oxidative stress and inflammatory response in patients with community acquired pneumonia: A randomized controlled trial. Medicine (Baltimore). 2018;97(45):e13087.
- AA Jackson, NR Gibson, Y Lu, F Synthesis of erythrocyte glutathione in healthy adults consuming the safe amount of dietary protein.Am J Clin Nutr. 2004;80(1):101-107.
- I Rahman. Inflammation and the regulation of glutathione level in lung epithelial cells. Antioxid Redox Signal. 1999;1(4):425-447.
