PERCEIVED LEVEL OF STRESS AND INSTABILITY GENOMIC AMONG GYM USERS

Abstract

Stress and the practice of physical exercises imply in several outcomes to the health of individuals, including cellular changes. The buccal micronucleus cytome assay (BMCyt) is a biomarker widely used to assess the impacts of lifestyle characteristics such as stress levels on nuclear changes. The aim of this study was to evaluate and relate the perceived level of stress on the occurrence of DNA damage, and other nuclear/cellular abnormalities in gym users. Descriptive cross-sectional study, carried out with 116 gym users from Madrid/Spain. A questionnaire was used to assess the perceived level of stress and BMCyt was used to assess DNA damage and other nuclear/cellular abnormalities. Of the 116 individuals evaluated, 54.3% reported being stressed at sometimes. There was no significant difference in relation to the reported stress level and the biomarkers of DNA damage (cells with micronuclei or nuclear buds), proliferative potential (frequency of basal cells), and cell death (cells with condensed chromatin, karyorrhexis, karyolysis and pyknotic) (p>0.05). However, gym users who reported being almost always/excessively stressed had significantly less frequency of binucleated cells (biomarker of cytogenetic defects) compared to individuals who reported being rarely stressed (p=0.008). Our results showed that the majority of gym users reported being stressed at sometimes. However, it was found that gym practitioners who reported being almost always/excessively stressed had a lower frequency of binucleated cells