Effects of high-intense resistance training on salivary cortisol in trained individuals: a systematic review (Efectos del entrenamiento de resistencia de alta intensidad sobre el cortisol salival en individuos entrenados: una revisión sistemática)

Abstract

This study aimed to evaluate the effects of high-intensity training (HIT) on salivary cortisol levels in physically trained individuals. This systematic review followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) recommendations. The search for scientific articles was carried out on the Scopus and MEDLINE (via PubMed) databases with the terms resistance training, saliva, cortisol, and their synonyms. We included interventions with high-intense resistance training that analyzed the salivary cortisol levels in physically trained men and women. From the 399 articles found, eight studies met the inclusion criteria. A population of 135 physically trained men and 12 women is with an average age of 23.26 ± 3.10 years, body mass of 85.53 ± 12.68 kg, and height of 1.80 ± 0.04 m. The intervention period ranged from 3 to 15 weeks with the use of 1 to 5 sets of 5 to 10 repetitions. Most protocols have been shown to provide significant stimuli to increase the level of cortisol acutely (p<0.05). The practice of HIT seems to be an effective intervention to stimulate the increase in acute and chronic salivary cortisol levels and thus induce possible changes in physiological and hormonal levels. Moreover, cortisol seems to represent physical activity in some populations and may be useful in monitoring physiology in large-scale observational physical activity surveys. However, more research is needed to elucidate the effects of HIT on cortisol and adaptive results.