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Tip
Sheet: Culture & Living Tip sheets highlight timely news and events at Washington University in St. Louis. For more information on any of the stories below or for assistance in arranging interviews, please see the contact information listed with each story. For comments on the Culture & Living news tips service, please contact the editor, Sue Killenberg McGinn at (314) 935-5254 or susan_killenberg_mcginn@aismail.wustl.edu. Chronic worries may raise risk for range of diseases Media assistance: Gerry Everding - (314) 935-6375 Source: Gregory Miller - (314) 935-6595 Related: American Psychological Association: "Chronic stress can interfere with normal function of the immune system, suggests new research" Related: Download PDF version of full-text journal article Related: Miller's Psychobiology of Health Lab [St. Louis, Mo., November 2002] - The parents of children battling serious cases of pediatric cancer may be worrying themselves sick, according to a new study from Washington University in St. Louis. Although researchers have long suspected a link between stress and health problems, this study is the first to document a specific hormonal process through which chronic stress compromises the human immune system. The study does not establish direct links between stress and any specific health problem, rather it reveals a process by which stress can cause abnormalities in the immune system, changes that could leave worriers more vulnerable to allergies, heart disease and a host of other health problems.
Published in the November 2002 issue of the American Psychological Association journal Health Psychology, the study compares health experiences of 25 parents caring for children with cancer and experiences of 25 parents with healthy children. In particular, researchers checked both groups for sensitivity to cortisol, a hormone responsible for terminating the immune system's inflammatory response to various illnesses and infections. Inflammation is the body's way of sending white blood cells and other infection-fighting chemicals known as cytokines to the site of an infection or injury, but too much inflammation can itself spur serious health problems. In this study, researchers used surveys to confirm that parents of children with cancer clearly suffered from chronic stress. Next, they used blood tests to document abnormalities in the immune systems of the stressed parents; specifically, worried parents showed a significantly diminished response to cortisol, leaving their bodies in an ongoing, elevated state of inflammation, a condition common in various autoimmune diseases and allergies. "The study showed that the white blood cells of chronically stressed parents did not respond well to the hormone cortisol's signal to terminate the inflammation process," Miller said. "Their immune systems just kept on making more cytokines." The good news from the study is that parents who received strong social supports, such as assistance coping with the economic and emotional challenges of coping with their child's illness, were able to lessen the detrimental effects of chronic stress, including most of the immunologic consequences detailed in this study. |
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