EVALUATION OF DERMAL SENSITIVITY

Abstract

DURING the past few years there has been a growing demand for more effective or more extensive pretesting of cosmetics and dermal pharmaceutical products, not only because of the increased use of newer ingredients, but also because in several recent instances, products apparently adequately tested by present prophetic methods have been found to be dermal sensitizers under use conditions. The publicity given these untoward reactions has resulted in Congressional Committee investigation, the recommendations from which have been for further extension of federal regulatory legislation. Such mandatory requirements for complete pretesting of cosmetic materials would be entirely in order if it were assured that the testing methods were reliable. That this has not been the case is illustrated by the beforementioned method failures, namely, products such as the nail polish undercoat and quaternary shampoos which showed themselves to be dangerous under use conditions. Arbitrary proposals to extend and