Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf Hamburg, Germany.
Stress. 2012 Jan;15(1):105-9. doi: 10.3109/10253890.2011.582200. Epub 2011 Jul 26.
Depression is associated with increased cortisol secretion and occurs more often in women than in men. Thus, it has been hypothesized that differences in cortisol secretion might, in part, be responsible for the greater risk of developing depression in women. However, only few studies have examined sex differences in baseline cortisol secretion in depressed patients and healthy controls. We examined sex effects on cortisol secretion in 52 medication-free patients with major depression (37 women, 15 men, mean ± SD age 35 ± 11 years, Hamilton Depression Scale mean score 27 ± 5) and 50 healthy age- and sex-matched control subjects. Salivary cortisol concentrations were measured at 8:00, 12:00, 16:00, and 22:00 h. Repeated measures analysis of covariance revealed a group × sex interaction (p = 0.05). Post hoc tests revealed higher cortisol concentrations in depressed compared to healthy men [F(1;29) = 7.5, p = 0.01]. No differences were found between depressed and non-depressed women. Our results do not support the hypothesis that differences in cortisol secretion between depressed and non-depressed subjects are more pronounced in women than in men. Study characteristics and methods as well as sex-specific confounding variables such as menstrual cycle, menopause and the use of oral contraceptives may account for inconclusive results across studies.
抑郁症与皮质醇分泌增加有关，且女性比男性更常见。因此，有人假设皮质醇分泌的差异可能部分导致女性患抑郁症的风险更高。然而，只有少数研究检查了抑郁患者和健康对照组中皮质醇基础分泌的性别差异。我们研究了 52 名无药物治疗的重度抑郁症患者（37 名女性，15 名男性，平均年龄 35 ± 11 岁，汉密尔顿抑郁量表平均得分 27 ± 5）和 50 名年龄和性别匹配的健康对照者的性别对皮质醇分泌的影响。唾液皮质醇浓度在 8:00、12:00、16:00 和 22:00 测量。重复测量方差分析显示组×性别交互作用（p = 0.05）。事后检验显示，与健康男性相比，抑郁症患者的皮质醇浓度更高[F(1;29) = 7.5，p = 0.01]。在抑郁和非抑郁女性之间未发现差异。我们的结果不支持这样的假设，即抑郁和非抑郁患者之间皮质醇分泌的差异在女性中比在男性中更为明显。研究特征和方法以及月经周期、绝经和口服避孕药等特定于性别的混杂变量可能导致研究结果不一致。
