Ozone as Janus: this controversial gas can be either toxic or medically useful
Bocci V. Mediators of Inflammation, 2004.
- Study type
- Review
- People studied
- No participants of its own (review)
- Published
- 2004, Mediators of Inflammation
- Identifiers
- PMID 15203558, DOI 10.1080/0962935062000197083
What the authors reported
Argues that ozone, though intrinsically toxic as an inhaled gas, produces a cascade of ozone-derived compounds when dissolved in blood at judicious, physician-controlled doses, yielding multifactorial beneficial effects in infections, vasculopathies, and orthopedic and dental conditions.
What limits this result
Single-author narrative review without a systematic search methodology or quantitative synthesis of the underlying evidence.
How ozone acts on blood and cells, how blood filters work, the laboratory and device-development studies behind the EBOO circuit, and studies that measure markers in the blood rather than how patients fare. None of these shows whether EBO2 helps patients. One study rarely settles a medical question; our guides weigh each paper against the rest of the evidence.
How the study was done
- Design
- Review, which the author says was written “in a personal way” to express “the reflections of an old ozone therapist”
- Setting
- Department of Physiology, University of Siena, Italy
- Read from
- Read from the full text of the paper. Read on September 28, 2026.
Safety as reported
Four deaths recorded due to pulmonary embolism during direct intravenous administration (of O2/O3 gas)
Source: Full text on PubMed Central
Funding and conflicts
Europe PMC's funding section for this article lists Medical Science Technology Corporation as a funder (its listing, not a statement read in the paper)
Source: Full text on PubMed Central
Where we cite this study
Does EBO2 (EBOO) Work? The Evidence, Study by Study
Every study in our EBO2 (EBOO) library in one place: design, size, what was measured and found, its limits, and a check for any study a clinic cites.
Ozone Therapy Adverse Events by Route: What Case Reports Show, and Where EBO2 (EBOO) Fits
Every ozone therapy adverse event we could read in case reports and series, grouped by route, plus how to search FDA's MAUDE data and report to MedWatch.
EBO2 (EBOO) Side Effects and Safety: What Studies, Case Reports, and Regulators Record
What the EBOO studies record about side effects, the harms documented with other ozone procedures, the risks of the circuit, and what regulators have found.