Variabilidade da frequência cardíaca e níveis de cortisol salivar entre policiais militares

Abstract

This study aims to validate the relationship between heart rate variability patterns and salivary cortisol levels in military police officers, based on measurements induced by the Trier social Stress Test (TSST). This is a cross-sectional experimental study, conducted between the months of February and November 2020, involving 30 male police officers in regular working activities for a year or more, aging over 18. The study excluded individuals with high blood pressure, diabetes, those carrying a pacemaker or a transplanted organ and teachers. The subjects were submitted to the TSST and their HRV and saliva (in order to measure cortisol levels) were taken at three moments: basal period and prior to the TSST, immediately after the test and 20 minutes after the second collection. For collecting the temporal series of RR intervals, we used the Polar®, v800 monitor. The project was approved by the Ethics and Research Committee of Universidade Brasil, CAAE: 85502418.0.0000.5494. The results showed that the TSST induced a physiological response which can be visualized in the cortisol concentrations (0.272 ± 0.221 e mean 0.220 µg/dL), p = 0.0001. With HRV analyzed by using linear time domain, frequency domain and non-linear methods, it was possible to identify that some variables show statistic difference (p< 0.05) among the distinct moments of the experimental protocol. Among the main contributions of this study, it was possible to point out the importance of cortisol, showing that it is related to HRV linear and non-linear measurements, as well as the strong positive linear correlation between the HRV variables. Thus, HRV used as an information tag of the physiological impacts caused by the experimental stress causes, in addition to being adopted as a complementary tool for police officers’ clinical evaluation, can also be an important biomarker to promote health. Promoting military police officers’ health is a big challenge, once strategies aimed at fighting stress related to police activities must be implemented so as to improve the quality of life and health of these professionals.