Premenstrual syndrome is associated with blunted cortisol reactivity to the TSST

Abstract

This study assessed the effects of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) and menstrual phases on the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, sympathetic nervous system axis and psychological responses to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). Thirty-six PMS women (mean age 21.69 ± 2.16 years) and 36 control women (mean age 22.03 ± 2.48 years) participated in the TSST task, either in the follicular phase or in the late luteal phase (each group N = 18). Saliva samples, heart rate and subjective stress levels were collected for seven time points throughout the test (10, 20, 30, 40, 55, 70 and 100 min). The results indicated that in comparison with control women, PMS women displayed blunted cortisol stress responses to the TSST irrespective of the menstrual phases, as indexed by the cortisol levels across time, area under the curve with respect to ground (AUCg) and peak change scores of cortisol. The results also demonstrated that the measurements indexed by cortisol levels across time, AUCg and peak change scores of heart rate were smaller in women tested during the late luteal phase than during the follicular phase. Correlation results indicated that AUCg was negatively correlated with PMS scores. These results suggest that measures of cortisol, rather than heart rate or subjective responses to stress, may be most closely associated with PMS. Furthermore, hypo-reactivity of the HPA axis may be pathologically relevant to PMS because it predicts heightened PMS severity.

Reduced Reward Responsiveness in Women With Moderate - to - Severe Premenstrual Syndrome: Evidence From a Probabilistic Reward Task

“…The Cronbach's alpha = 0.80 in Wu et al (29) and 0.91 in the present study. Furthermore, the scale was deemed valid in differentiating women with PMS from those without PMS (21,(29)(30)(31) and reflected PMS severity (32,33).…”

Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder: Epidemiology and Treatment

“…Women with PMDD show evidence of altered hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis function, including lower cortisol levels during mental stress [50, 75] and higher baseline cortisol levels during the luteal phase [29] compared to controls. However, findings have been mixed, with some reports of typical HPA function in women with PMDD [76], or altered HPA indicators only in a subset of PMDD women, e.g., blunted nocturnal cortisol was exhibited only by PMDD women with high serum levels of ALLO [77••].…”

Aktuelle Aspekte zur Prämenstruellen Dysphorischen Störung – Ein Überblick

“…Auf biologischer Basis wird aufgrund des engen Zusammenhangs zwischen Stress und prämenstrueller Symptomatik u. a. eine pathologische Dysregulation der endokrinologischen Stressachse [77][78][79] bzw. eine Interaktion zwischen der PMDS-spezifischen Vulnerabilität gegenüber zyklusassoziierten hormonellen Veränderungen und dem neuroendokrinologischen Stresssystem diskutiert (vgl.…”

“…[19,49]). Erste experimentelle Studien sprechen für eine abgeflachte Stressreaktion von Frauen mit PMDS in Reaktion auf Stressoren [15,77,79]. So fanden Klatzkin und Kollegen [15] bei betroffenen Frauen eine verminderte endokrinologische Stressreaktivität (Blutdruck, Herzrate) in Reaktion auf einen experimentellen Stressor, unabhängig davon, ob die Frauen in der Vorgeschichte an einer Depression litten.…”

“…So fanden Klatzkin und Kollegen [15] bei betroffenen Frauen eine verminderte endokrinologische Stressreaktivität (Blutdruck, Herzrate) in Reaktion auf einen experimentellen Stressor, unabhängig davon, ob die Frauen in der Vorgeschichte an einer Depression litten. Ähnliches zeigte sich in einer Studie von Huang et al [77], die bei Frauen mit PMDS eine geringere Cortisolaktivität in stressreichen Situationen ermittelten. Eine abgeschwächte stressreaktive Cortisolaktivität könnte damit einen möglichen Mechanismus kennzeichnen, welcher einer erhöhten subjektiven Stressreaktivität von Frauen mit PMDS zugrunde liegt.…”