Cargando…

Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol

BACKGROUND: Domestic violence and abuse is threatening behavior, violence/abuse used by one person to control the other within an intimate or family-type relationship. Women experience more severe physical and sexual domestic violence and abuse and more mental health consequences than men. The curre...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Lokhmatkina, Natalia V, Feder, Gene, Blake, Sarah, Morris, Richard, Powers, Victoria, Lightman, Stafford
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3716999/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23849084
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-244X-13-188
_version_ 1782277637099487232
author Lokhmatkina, Natalia V
Feder, Gene
Blake, Sarah
Morris, Richard
Powers, Victoria
Lightman, Stafford
author_facet Lokhmatkina, Natalia V
Feder, Gene
Blake, Sarah
Morris, Richard
Powers, Victoria
Lightman, Stafford
author_sort Lokhmatkina, Natalia V
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Domestic violence and abuse is threatening behavior, violence/abuse used by one person to control the other within an intimate or family-type relationship. Women experience more severe physical and sexual domestic violence and abuse and more mental health consequences than men. The current study aims at exploring of the role of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis activity in abuse impact on women's mental health. Study objectives: 1) To evaluate diurnal cortisol slope, cortisol awakening response, and the mean cortisol concentration in women with a current or recent experience of abuse; 2) To estimate whether cortisol secretion is associated with type, severity, duration and cessation of abuse; 3) To investigate whether cortisol acts as mediator between abuse and mental health condition; 4) To examine whether there is any distinction in cortisol levels between those women exposed to both childhood abuse and domestic violence and abuse and those experienced only the latter. 4) To explore whether cortisol secretion differs between women living in refuge and those still living in the community. METHODS/DESIGN: To meet study objectives 128 women will be recruited in a domestic violence agency and local communities. Baseline and 3-month follow-up measures will be taken over 6 months after recruitment. Each assessment will include: (1) standardized self-administered questionnaires to evaluate socio-demographics, experience of violence and abuse, mental and physical health; (2) weight and height measurement; (3) self-completion of wakening, post-wakening and evening saliva samples. Saliva will be analysed for cortisol and cortisone using Ultra performance liquid chromatography – tandem mass spectrometry. We will compare diurnal cortisol parameters between non-abused controls and abuse survivors with and without mental health conditions. First following descriptive statistics for all the cortisol and mental health outcomes, relationships between them will be investigated using appropriate regression models. Second, these techniques will be used to investigate the extent to which cortisol measures act as potential mediators between type, severity, duration of abuse and mental disorders. DISCUSSION: Results of the study will increase our understanding of the pathophysiological mechanisms of abuse-related mental health disorders in women and inform researchers and practitioners on the possibility of using salivary cortisol as a biological marker for prognosis, diagnosis, and treatment evaluation among abuse survivors. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov registration NCT01632553
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-3716999
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2013
publisher BioMed Central
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-37169992013-07-21 Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol Lokhmatkina, Natalia V Feder, Gene Blake, Sarah Morris, Richard Powers, Victoria Lightman, Stafford BMC Psychiatry Study Protocol BACKGROUND: Domestic violence and abuse is threatening behavior, violence/abuse used by one person to control the other within an intimate or family-type relationship. Women experience more severe physical and sexual domestic violence and abuse and more mental health consequences than men. The current study aims at exploring of the role of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis activity in abuse impact on women's mental health. Study objectives: 1) To evaluate diurnal cortisol slope, cortisol awakening response, and the mean cortisol concentration in women with a current or recent experience of abuse; 2) To estimate whether cortisol secretion is associated with type, severity, duration and cessation of abuse; 3) To investigate whether cortisol acts as mediator between abuse and mental health condition; 4) To examine whether there is any distinction in cortisol levels between those women exposed to both childhood abuse and domestic violence and abuse and those experienced only the latter. 4) To explore whether cortisol secretion differs between women living in refuge and those still living in the community. METHODS/DESIGN: To meet study objectives 128 women will be recruited in a domestic violence agency and local communities. Baseline and 3-month follow-up measures will be taken over 6 months after recruitment. Each assessment will include: (1) standardized self-administered questionnaires to evaluate socio-demographics, experience of violence and abuse, mental and physical health; (2) weight and height measurement; (3) self-completion of wakening, post-wakening and evening saliva samples. Saliva will be analysed for cortisol and cortisone using Ultra performance liquid chromatography – tandem mass spectrometry. We will compare diurnal cortisol parameters between non-abused controls and abuse survivors with and without mental health conditions. First following descriptive statistics for all the cortisol and mental health outcomes, relationships between them will be investigated using appropriate regression models. Second, these techniques will be used to investigate the extent to which cortisol measures act as potential mediators between type, severity, duration of abuse and mental disorders. DISCUSSION: Results of the study will increase our understanding of the pathophysiological mechanisms of abuse-related mental health disorders in women and inform researchers and practitioners on the possibility of using salivary cortisol as a biological marker for prognosis, diagnosis, and treatment evaluation among abuse survivors. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov registration NCT01632553 BioMed Central 2013-07-13 /pmc/articles/PMC3716999/ /pubmed/23849084 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-244X-13-188 Text en Copyright © 2013 Lokhmatkina et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Study Protocol
Lokhmatkina, Natalia V
Feder, Gene
Blake, Sarah
Morris, Richard
Powers, Victoria
Lightman, Stafford
Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
title Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
title_full Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
title_fullStr Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
title_full_unstemmed Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
title_short Longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
title_sort longitudinal measurement of cortisol in association with mental health and experience of domestic violence and abuse: study protocol
topic Study Protocol
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3716999/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23849084
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-244X-13-188
work_keys_str_mv AT lokhmatkinanataliav longitudinalmeasurementofcortisolinassociationwithmentalhealthandexperienceofdomesticviolenceandabusestudyprotocol
AT federgene longitudinalmeasurementofcortisolinassociationwithmentalhealthandexperienceofdomesticviolenceandabusestudyprotocol
AT blakesarah longitudinalmeasurementofcortisolinassociationwithmentalhealthandexperienceofdomesticviolenceandabusestudyprotocol
AT morrisrichard longitudinalmeasurementofcortisolinassociationwithmentalhealthandexperienceofdomesticviolenceandabusestudyprotocol
AT powersvictoria longitudinalmeasurementofcortisolinassociationwithmentalhealthandexperienceofdomesticviolenceandabusestudyprotocol
AT lightmanstafford longitudinalmeasurementofcortisolinassociationwithmentalhealthandexperienceofdomesticviolenceandabusestudyprotocol