ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVES: The objectives of this study were to assess the influence of trauma caused by forced expulsion from home in a war-ravaged region on the psychological, hormonal, and immune responses in displaced persons and to analyze the relationships between psychometric, hormonal, and immunologic variables. METHODS: Participants were 20 displaced and 14 control women. Psychosomatic response was evaluated using the COR-NEX2 test. Serum concentrations of cortisol, prolactin, endorphin, thyroxine, and triiodothyronine were measured by radioimmunoassay. Immunophenotyping and lymphocyte proliferation were determined by flow cytometry, and phagocyte functions (i.e., ingestion and antibody-dependent cytotoxicity) against 51Cr-labeled sheep red blood cells were assessed through radioactivity uptake and release, respectively. RESULTS: In comparison with control women, displaced women had higher COR-NEX2 test scores; higher serum cortisol, prolactin, and endorphin levels; an increase in activated phenotype within all three measured cell populations (i.e., B, T, and natural killer cells); as well as an enhanced proportion of proliferating lymphocytes in freshly isolated samples. However, the phytohemagglutinin-stimulated proliferative response, estimated as the stimulation index, was lower in displaced women. A complex pattern of relations between psychological, hormonal, and immune responses was observed. CONCLUSIONS: Chronic psychological stress elicited multiple, predominantly stimulatory influences on immune functions.
Subject(s)
Antibody-Dependent Cell Cytotoxicity/immunology , Arousal/physiology , Hormones/blood , Lymphocyte Activation/immunology , Phagocytosis/immunology , Refugees/psychology , Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic/physiopathology , Warfare , Adolescent , Adult , Croatia , Female , Humans , Immune Tolerance/immunology , Immunophenotyping , Lymphocyte Subsets/immunology , Personality Inventory , Psychophysiologic Disorders/diagnosis , Psychophysiologic Disorders/physiopathology , Psychophysiologic Disorders/psychology , Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic/diagnosis , Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic/psychologyABSTRACT
Psychological and hormonal responses to various degrees of war-related traumatic experience were analysed in 91 subjects. Their psychological responses (psychosomatic, personality traits, etc.) were evaluated by the COR-NEX2 test. Based on test results, the subjects were classified into three groups: G1 = normal, G2 = moderate, and G3 = severe response. The distribution of subjects in the three groups was related to the intensity and duration of stress that they had been exposed to. Serum levels of cortisol, prolactin, beta-endorphin, thyroxin and triiodothyronine were analysed in all subjects. The levels of cortisol and prolactin were significantly decreased in subjects expressing a severe psychological response, while the level of prolactin correlated with COR-NEX2 test scores. Although relations to other intervening variables are to be investigated, our results indicated that endocrine changes, following trauma, were not random, but rather related to stress-induced psychological responses, and not to trauma per se.
