Neurobiological effects of work-related stress: protocol for a case-control neuroimaging study

TY - JOUR

T1 - Neurobiological effects of work-related stress

T2 - protocol for a case-control neuroimaging study

AU - Madsen, Saga Steinmann

AU - Gjedde, Albert

AU - Brandt, Lars

AU - Pihl-Thingvad, Jesper

AU - Videbech, Poul

AU - Gerke, Oke

AU - Højlund-Carlsen, Poul Flemming

N1 - Articles published in the DMJ are “open access”. This means that the articles are distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial License, which permits any non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.

PY - 2018/11

Y1 - 2018/11

N2 - INTRODUCTION: Stress is one of the greatest burdens of our society and often implies impairments in cognitive and emotional functions. Here, we hypothesise that changes in the brain’s dopamine (DA)-based mesocorticolimbic projections in patients with work-related stress (adjustment disorder) will manifest themselves as altered glucose metabolism in relation to neural activity, and as altered DA radiotracer binding potentials at the relevant receptors. METHODS: Subjects and healthy controls undergo neuropsychiatric tests and PET/MRI with three tracers; 18 F-fluorodeoxyglucose to measure glucose metabolism as a marker of neural activity,11C-raclopride to explore binding potentials in the striatum, and11C-FLB 457 to study possibly impaired mesocortical dopaminergic transmission in the cortex. To demonstrate differences of glucose metabolism, more than 2 × 41 patients/controls are needed. We expect to find that symptoms of cognitive and motivational reward deficits are attributable to changes in the frontal lobe and striatal glucose metabolism in the majority of patients, and that changes of D2-receptor availability and impaired dopaminergic transmission in the striatum and prefrontal cortex are contributing factors. CONCLUSIONS: This project is designed to generate entirely new and objective evidence of stress-induced cerebral illness, and to provide a basis for in-depth research and for a more rational management of this strenuous disorder.

AB - INTRODUCTION: Stress is one of the greatest burdens of our society and often implies impairments in cognitive and emotional functions. Here, we hypothesise that changes in the brain’s dopamine (DA)-based mesocorticolimbic projections in patients with work-related stress (adjustment disorder) will manifest themselves as altered glucose metabolism in relation to neural activity, and as altered DA radiotracer binding potentials at the relevant receptors. METHODS: Subjects and healthy controls undergo neuropsychiatric tests and PET/MRI with three tracers; 18 F-fluorodeoxyglucose to measure glucose metabolism as a marker of neural activity,11C-raclopride to explore binding potentials in the striatum, and11C-FLB 457 to study possibly impaired mesocortical dopaminergic transmission in the cortex. To demonstrate differences of glucose metabolism, more than 2 × 41 patients/controls are needed. We expect to find that symptoms of cognitive and motivational reward deficits are attributable to changes in the frontal lobe and striatal glucose metabolism in the majority of patients, and that changes of D2-receptor availability and impaired dopaminergic transmission in the striatum and prefrontal cortex are contributing factors. CONCLUSIONS: This project is designed to generate entirely new and objective evidence of stress-induced cerebral illness, and to provide a basis for in-depth research and for a more rational management of this strenuous disorder.

KW - Case-Control Studies

KW - Corpus Striatum/diagnostic imaging

KW - Female

KW - Fluorodeoxyglucose F18

KW - Frontal Lobe/diagnostic imaging

KW - Glucose/metabolism

KW - Humans

KW - Magnetic Resonance Imaging/methods

KW - Male

KW - Neuroimaging/methods

KW - Occupational Stress/diagnostic imaging

KW - Positron-Emission Tomography/methods

KW - Prefrontal Cortex/diagnostic imaging

KW - Pyrrolidines

KW - Raclopride

KW - Radiopharmaceuticals

KW - Research Design

KW - Salicylamides

KW - Synaptic Transmission/drug effects

U2 - http://ugeskriftet.dk/dmj/neurobiological-effects-work-related-stress-protocol-case-control-neuroimaging-study

DO - http://ugeskriftet.dk/dmj/neurobiological-effects-work-related-stress-protocol-case-control-neuroimaging-study

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 30382017

SN - 1603-9629

VL - 65

JO - Danish Medical Journal

JF - Danish Medical Journal

IS - 11

M1 - A5513

ER -