ArticleHormone research in paediatrics2018
Maternal Stress During Pregnancy Is Associated with Decreased Cortisol and Cortisone Levels in Neonatal Hair.
Article in Hormone research in paediatrics, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 34 citations in OpenAlex.
- A systematic review of associations between hormone levels in hair and peripartum depression.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2025Pooled it
- Hair cortisol as outcome parameter for psychological and neuropsychiatric interventions-a literature review.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Pooled it
- A systematic review of hair cortisol during pregnancy: Reference ranges and methodological considerations.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2020Pooled it
- Developmental and environmental determinants of hair steroids in children from birth to two years postnatally: A comprehensive analysis.Comprehensive psychoneuroendocrinology · 2026Article
- Experiences of discrimination during pregnancy predict altered neonatal hair cortisol at birth.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2025Article
- Exploring Relationship Between Immunocompetence, HPA Axis Functioning and Performances of Preweaning Dairy Calves.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2024Article
- Higher prenatal anxiety predicts lower neonatal hair cortisol.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2024Article
- Bdnf-Nrf-2 crosstalk and emotional behavior are disrupted in a sex-dependent fashion in adolescent mice exposed to maternal stress or maternal obesity.Translational psychiatry · 2023Article
- Perinatal Stressors and Consequences for Neonates with Critical Congenital Heart Disease.Journal of cardiovascular development and disease · 2023Article
- Cortisol Regulation among Women Who Experience Suicidal Ideation during Pregnancy.Journal of affective disorders reports · 2023Article
- Article
- Perinatal determinants of neonatal hair glucocorticoid concentrations.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2021Article
- The Association between Maternal Stress and Glucocorticoid Rhythmicity in Human Milk.Nutrients · 2021Article
- Toxic stress, health and nutrition among Brazilian children in shelters.BMC pediatrics · 2021Article
- An exploratory study of perinatal hair cortisol concentrations in mother-infant dyads with severe psychiatric disorders versus healthy controls.BJPsych open · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
9 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundHair glucocorticoids (GCs) offer a retrospective view on chronic GC exposure. We assessed whether maternal pre- and postnatal stress was associated with neonatal and maternal hair GCs postpartum (pp).
methodsOn the first day pp 172 mother-infant pairs donated hair, of whom 67 had consulted a centre of expertise for psychiatric disorders during pregnancy. Maternal stress was scored on the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale during the first/second (n = 46), third trimester (n = 57), and pp (n = 172). Hair cortisol and cortisone levels were determined by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry, and associations with maternal hospital anxiety subscale (HAS) and hospital depression subscale (HDS) scores, and antidepressant use were analyzed with linear regression.
resultsNeonatal hair GCs were negatively associated with elevated HAS-scores during the first/second trimester, log 10 (β [95% CI]) cortisol -0.19 (-0.39 to 0.02) p = 0.07, cortisone -0.10 (-0.25 to 0.05) p = 0.17; third trimester, cortisol -0.17 (-0.33 to 0.00) p = 0.05, cortisone -0.17 (-0.28 to -0.05) p = 0.01; and pp, cortisol -0.14 (-0.25 to -0.02) p = 0.02, cortisone -0.07 (-0.16 to 0.02) p = 0.10. A similar pattern was observed for elevated HDS-scores. Maternal hair GCs were positively associated with elevated HAS-scores pp (cortisol 0.17 [0.01 to 0.32] p = 0.04, cortisone 0.18 [0.06 to 0.31] p = 0.01), but not prenatally or with elevated HDS-scores. Antidepressant use was associated with elevated maternal hair GCs (p ≤ 0.05), but not with neonatal hair GCs.
conclusionExposure to excessive pre- and perinatal maternal stress was associated with a decrease in neonatal hair GCs, while elevated stress-scores around birth were associated with increased maternal hair GCs and elevated stress-scores earlier in gestation were not associated with maternal hair GCs pp. Further studies are needed to test associations with infant neurodevelopment.
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