Mental stress on saliva chromogranin A in dry mouth

[背景与目的]明确口干的病因是治疗口干的关键。在口干的各种原因中，精神压力被认为是唾液分泌减少的原因，尽管这一理论仍在讨论中。近年来，唾液嗜铬粒蛋白A（CgA）作为一种新的精神应激标志物被报道，其检测灵敏、无创。在这项研究中，我们测量了CgA在有限的唾液样本从口干患者。[方法] 40例口干患者（男6例，女34例，年龄52-81岁）和20例年龄、性别匹配的健康体检者。分别用唾液导管和吸管同时从双侧腮腺和口底表面收集唾液。收集的唾液立即放入塑料容器中并冷冻。CgA测量在另一个专门机构进行单盲评价。我们有意制造了一些仅由0.20 ml生理盐水组成的仿制样品，并将其与提供给实验室的唾液样品混合。[结果]各地区采集的唾液量非常有限，范围为0.05 ~ 0.40ml。模拟样品的CgA测量值低于0.05 pmol/ml。CgA中两个腮腺之间有很好的相关性，但腮腺与口底之间没有相关性。健康人腮腺唾液中CgA浓度小于1.02 pmol/ml。9例口干患者腮腺唾液CgA明显升高。[结论]即使使用有限的样本，也可以对口干患者的唾液CgA进行有意义的测定。此外，这些结果表明精神压力和口干之间存在正相关。

[Background and Purpose] Investigating the exact cause of dry mouth should be important for successful treatment. Among various causes of dry mouth, mental stress is speculated to be a cause of decreasing saliva secretion, although this theory remains under discussion. Recently, saliva chromograninA (CgA) was reported as a new mental stress marker, which facilitated sensitive and non-invasive measurement. In this study, we measured CgA in a limited saliva sample from dry mouth patients. [Methods] We included 40 dry mouth patients (6 males and 34 females, 52-81 years old) and 20 age- and sex-matched healthy subjects. The saliva was simultaneously collected from the bilateral parotid gland and on the surface of oral floor by salivary catheter, and by stype, respectively. The collected saliva was immediately put in the plastic container and frozen. CgA measurement was performed at another specialized institution for single-blind evaluation. We intentionally created some imitation samples consisting of 0.20ml physiologic saline only and mixed these among the saliva samples supplied to the laboratory. [Results] The saliva collected from each region was very limited, ranging from 0.05 to 0.40ml. The CgA measurement of the imitation samples was below 0.05 pmol/ml. There was a good correlation between both parotid glands in CgA, but there was no correlation between the parotid gland and oral floor. The concentration of parotid saliva CgA in healthy subjects was less than 1.02 pmol/ml. There was a marked rise in parotid saliva CgA in 9 dry mouth patients. [Conclusion] The saliva CgA of dry mouth patients could be meaningfully measured even using a limited sample. Furthermore, these results suggest a positive association between mental stress and dry mouth.