Physical Demands and Salivary Immunoglobulin A Responses of Elite Australian Rules Football Athletes to Match Play

Abstract

The findings indicate that an increase in player load during AFL preseason match play resulted in compromised postmatch mucosal immunological function. Longitudinal assessment of AFL-match player load and mucosal immunological function across the first 60 h of recovery may augment monitoring and preparedness strategies for athletes.

Validity and reliability evidence of a point of care assessment of salivary cortisol and α-amylase: a pre-registered study

“…Monte Carlo simulations (L. K. (Muthén & Muthén, 2002) indicated that 15 participants would provide sufficient power (100%) to detect a conservative effect size (r ∼0.50) when incorporating prior beliefs informed by past research (Coad et al, 2015a;Coad et al, 2015b;Fisher, McLellan & Sinclair, 2015) directly into the estimation process. Full details of these power simulations are available on the Open Science Framework (OSF; http://bit.ly/2HCA6MR).…”

“…Caution is urged when interpreting these findings as the sample sizes for the chosen designs were small. The iPro Lab has also been validated at assessing the immune marker, salivary immunoglobulin-A, at rest (Coad, Gray & McLellan, 2016;Coad et al, 2015a;Coad et al, 2015b), and after teamsport (intermittent) exercise (Coad, Gray & McLellan, 2016;Coad et al, 2015b). However, whether the newer and more portable version of this device (iPro Cube) can be used to assess α-amylase at rest, and to measure relatively small changes in salivary cortisol and α-amylase post-moderate intensity exercise remains unknown.…”

“…Therefore, our aim was to test in the field the reliability and validity of the iPro Cube to measure salivary cortisol and α-amylase as compared to the common laboratory standard method (ELISA). On the basis of a conservative estimate from past research (Coad et al, 2015a;Coad et al, 2015b;Fisher, McLellan & Sinclair, 2015), we hypothesised that; 1. For salivary cortisol and α-amylase, respectively, POC assessment will correlate positively and moderately (r ∼0.50) with a laboratory-based assessment (a) preexercise (resting baseline), (b) immediately post-exercise, and (c) 30 min postexercise.…”

Respiratory inflammation and infections in high‐performance athletes

“…The best predictive use of salivary IgA is monitoring immune status in individual athletes over time, particularly those with a history of URS 26 , 27 . The recent development of a point‐of‐care device for quantifying salivary IgA 24 has improved the ability to undertake research in field environments 44 and provide timely results for monitoring and management of athletes.…”

“…Until recently, the use of salivary IgA as a biomarker has been limited because of time‐consuming laboratory assays and delays in obtaining timely results. The availability of point‐of‐care detection systems for salivary IgA 24 pave the way for more systematic monitoring of immune status in athletes.…”