Salivary Diurnal Cortisol Predicts Post-Traumatic Stress Symptoms in Parents of Infants With Congenital Heart Disease.
Amy Jo Lisanti, Fanghong Dong, Abigail Demianczyk and 5 others
PMID 38166230WHAT IT FOUND
Higher total daily salivary cortisol in parents during hospitalization after their infant's heart surgery was linked to more post-traumatic stress symptoms three months later.
Anxiety and depression links did not hold after accounting for other factors.
Key findings
01Salivary cortisol area under the curve was associated with more post-traumatic stress symptoms three months after discharge.
02Salivary cortisol area under the curve showed associations with anxiety and depression, but neither association held after adjustment.
03Mothers and fathers did not differ on all study variables.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
This was an exploratory pilot with 40 analysed parents, so it cannot establish that cortisol causes or predicts distress in all parents. Fourteen of 56 enrolled parents were lost to follow-up, and one dyad was withdrawn, so the analysed group may not represent all parents. The sample was English-speaking and mostly White (29 of 40 parents) and highly educated (32 of 40 parents had some college or above); families with infants in palliative care, listed for transplant, or with other syndromes, and parents on psychotropic medication were excluded. Saliva collection times were not strictly controlled, and events between discharge and three months were not measured, so other factors may explain symptoms. Several outcomes and cortisol measures were examined, and all results were labelled exploratory.
Declared interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest. Funding was from the Cardiac Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and Dr. Lisanti was supported by the National Institute of Nursing Research.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that salivary cortisol testing should be used to identify at-risk parents. This was an exploratory pilot with 40 analysed parents, and the adjusted association was only with post-traumatic stress symptoms; anxiety and depression associations did not hold.