The effects of sex hormones on immune function: a meta-analysis
The effects of sex hormones on immune function: a meta-analysis
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DOI：
10.1111/brv.12243
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发表时间：
2017-02-01
影响因子：
10
通讯作者：
Simmons, Leigh W.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Foo, Yong Zhi;Nakagawa, Shinichi;Simmons, Leigh W.
性激素对免疫功能的影响受到广泛关注，特别是在免疫功能障碍假说的提出之后。已经进行了许多实验性和相关性研究来测试免疫功能与男性性激素睾酮和女性雌激素之间的关系。然而，结果好坏参半。我们进行了四项跨物种荟萃分析，以研究性激素与免疫功能之间的关系：（i）睾酮控制对男性免疫功能的影响，（ii）男性循环睾酮水平与免疫功能之间的相关性，（iii）雌激素控制对女性免疫功能的影响，以及（iv）女性循环雌激素水平与免疫功能之间的相关性。实验研究结果表明，睾酮对免疫功能有中等程度的免疫抑制作用。另一方面，雌激素的作用取决于所使用的免疫措施。雌激素抑制细胞介导的免疫功能，同时减少寄生虫负荷。尽管有荟萃分析的能力，但睾酮或雌激素循环性激素水平与免疫功能之间的总体相关性（荟萃分析关系）并不具有统计学意义。这些结果表明，相关研究对于测试性激素对免疫功能的影响的价值有限。我们使用间接测试在四个数据集中几乎没有发现发表偏倚的证据。睾酮实验研究的发表年份和效应大小之间存在微弱的正相关关系，在我们控制去势和免疫测量后，这种关系变得不显着，这表明时间趋势是由于这些调节剂随时间的变化而造成的。图形分析表明，时间趋势是由于随着时间的推移细胞因子测量的使用增加所致。除了睾酮的相关研究之外，即使我们考虑了相关的随机和固定因素，我们也发现效应大小存在很大的异质性。总之，我们的结果提供了良好的证据，证明睾酮抑制免疫功能，并且雌激素的作用根据所使用的免疫措施而变化。
The effects of sex hormones on immune function have received much attention, especially following the proposal of the immunocompetence handicap hypothesis. Many studies, both experimental and correlational, have been conducted to test the relationship between immune function and the sex hormones testosterone in males and oestrogen in females. However, the results are mixed. We conducted four cross-species meta-analyses to investigate the relationship between sex hormones and immune function: (i) the effect of testosterone manipulation on immune function in males, (ii) the correlation between circulating testosterone level and immune function in males, (iii) the effect of oestrogen manipulation on immune function in females, and (iv) the correlation between circulating oestrogen level and immune function in females. The results from the experimental studies showed that testosterone had a medium-sized immunosuppressive effect on immune function. The effect of oestrogen, on the other hand, depended on the immune measure used. Oestrogen suppressed cell-mediated immune function while reducing parasite loads. The overall correlation (meta-analytic relationship) between circulating sex hormone level and immune function was not statistically significant for either testosterone or oestrogen despite the power of meta-analysis. These results suggest that correlational studies have limited value for testing the effects of sex hormones on immune function. We found little evidence of publication bias in the four data sets using indirect tests. There was a weak and positive relationship between year of publication and effect size for experimental studies of testosterone that became non-significant after we controlled for castration and immune measure, suggesting that the temporal trend was due to changes in these moderators over time. Graphical analyses suggest that the temporal trend was due to an increased use of cytokine measures across time. We found substantial heterogeneity in effect sizes, except in correlational studies of testosterone, even after we accounted for the relevant random and fixed factors. In conclusion, our results provide good evidence that testosterone suppresses immune function and that the effect of oestrogen varies depending on the immune measure used.