| Abstract [eng] |
Hair Cortisol Concentration Determination by High Performance Liquid Chromatography and Application for Assessment of Chronic Stress. Summary Stress is considered to be one of the risk factors for various diseases. It can be evaluated by various psychological tests, according to antropometric data or by measuring cortisol concentration. Cortisol found in saliva, urine and blood is used as a stress biomarker to confirm the state of acute stress, although the detection of this hormone in the aforementioned bodily fluids enables the evaluation of a short-term increase in cortisol concentration and does not translate well into a long-term process. It is a well-known fact that various substances tend to be deposited in the hair, therefore hair cortisol content was evaluated as a marker for chronic stress. Hair grows about 1 cm per month and cortisol content in one centimeter of hair reflects the medium concentration of the hormone and the level of stress over one month. This enables one to analyze long-term stress related processes. Methods. 25 – 55 year old healthy males were subject to evaluation. A psychosocial questionnaire from the LiVicordia project was used to evaluate the psychological level of stress. HPLC-FLU and ELISA were used for the quantitative cortisol analysis. Microsoft Excel 2007 and IBM SPSS (V.23) software packages were used for the statistical analysis of the data. Results. The HPLC-FLU system cannot be used to quantitatively determine hair cortisol because it is not sensitive enough. The median amount of 35.4 pg/mg of cortisol was determined in 25-26 mg of hair. The median amount of saliva cortisol was equal to 9.0 ng/mL. There was no correlation between hair cortisol and saliva cortisol (p=0.306). No correlation between BMI or ABP and hair cortisol was found. None of the parts of the psychosocial questionnaire was found to correlate with hair cortisol contents. Some links were found between certain parts of the test and hair cortisol content. Conclusions. The sensitivity of high performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection for hair cortisol analysis was insufficient. The mean hair cortisol level in healthy 25-55 year old men was 64.2 ± 70.6 pg/mg with lowest value being 9.65, highest - 811.91 pg / mg, and a median - 35.4 pg / mg. The relations between hair cortisol level corresponding long-term secretion and salivary morning cortisol level cortisol corresponding basal secretion was not found. There was no statistically significant relation between the hair cortisol level and psychosocial assessment score. However, there was a tendency of higher hair cortisol levels in patients with poor social integration and strong immersion traits. |
