Comparison of urinary and plasma catecholamine responses to mental stress

Abstract

8 subjects were exposed to the Stroop mental performance test in a design with alternating hourly periods of rest and stress. During each period one urine sample and several venous plasma samples were obtained. Heart rate responded rapidly to initiation and termination of the stress exposure with increases and decreases respectively. Both urinary and plasma adrenaline increased significantly during stress. The plasma response was immediate and sustained. Neither urinary, nor plasma noradrenaline were significantly increased by the test. Plasma noradrenaline, however, increased significantly on termination of the exposure to stress. It was suggested that the latter effect may be due to muscle sympathetic nerve activity decreasing during stress and increasing following stress. The sample-to-sample variation was more than 20% of the mean for both catecholamines, indicating the need for frequent sampling to reliably reflect plasma levels. The mean intraindividual plasma/urine correlation was r = 0.70 (p less than 0.001) for adrenaline and r = 0.40 (p less than 0.05) for noradrenaline. When only resting periods were considered, no significant correlations remained, apparently due to a reduced range of variation and accompanying reduced signal-to-noise ratio. It is concluded that both urinary and plasma adrenaline may be useful in the evaluation of changes in sympatho-adrenal activity during stress.

Neuroendocrine and Psychophysiologic Responses in PTSD: A Symptom Provocation Study

“…In these studies, consistent with our findings, when a NE response was present, a significant correlation existed between Epi and NE responses. At times, the NE response appeared later then the Epi response (sometimes with the termination of stress), and it was proposed that changes in muscular sympathetic tone are responsible for this effect (Akerstedt et al 1983). In agreement with our findings, when both HPA and catecholamine responses were studied, no evidence for a relationship between HPA axis and catecholamine responses was found, suggesting independent regulating mechanisms for these systems (Malarkey et al 1995).…”

Poziom katecholamin w ślinie podczas stresu egzaminacyjnego i wysiłku poznawczego

“…mental stress (Boyle i in., 2014), choć można się spotkać także z mental effort (Howells, Stein, Russell, 2010), cognitive stress (Leistad i in., 2007) czy wreszcie cognitive effort (Ansari, Derakshan, 2011). Wśród testów wykonywanych w tego rodzaju badaniach najczęściej stosowano Test Stroopa (Fairclough, Houston, 2004;Okamura i in., 2010;Schommer, Hellhammer, Kirschbaum, 2003), uważany za szczególnie skuteczne narzędzie wywołujące aktywność układu współczulnego (Hjemdahl i in., 1983). Konflikt słowo-kolor jest wówczas traktowany jako stresor.…”

“…Wykonywanie testów poznawczych podnosi poziom adrenaliny (Åkerstedt i in., 1983;Fibiger, Evans, Singer, 1986;Wilkinson i in., 1998), podczas gdy wyniki dotyczące noradrenaliny są sprzeczne i wahają się od spadków (Jörgensen, Bönlökke, Ristensen, 1985), poprzez brak zmian (Leistad i in., 2007;Sugimoto, Kanai, Shoji, 2009) do wzrostów (Åkerstedt i in., 1983;Januszewicz i in., 1979;Sothmann i in., 1988). Dotychczasowe badania wskazują, iż obwodowe stężenie dopaminy jest niewrażliwe zarówno na ostre stresory (Bassett, Marshall, Spillane, 1987), jak i na wysiłek poznawczy (Fibiger, Evans, Singer, 1986).…”

Behavioral and psychophysiological effects of the physical work environment. Research strategies and measurement methods.

“…Blood and urine measures reflect environmental impacts in a similar way (32). For cortisol, the correlation between measures ob tained in blood and in urine is also fairl y high (33).…”