Candidate Biomarkers to Evaluate the Association Between Psychosocial Stressors and Cardiovascular Diseases

Introduction: The association between psychosocial stressors and cardiovas-cular diseases had been suggested. Aims: This review was performed to assess, from literature data, the perti-nence of using new biomarkers in the occurrence or prognosis of cardiovas-cular diseases in a psychosocial context. Methods: We choose to consider wide-ranging descriptions of psychologi-cal stressors (occupational stress, financial strain, marital stress, social isola-tion, etc.) that may induce or influence the cardiovascular diseases' out-come. We addressed literature data confirming the link between candidate biomarkers, such as cortisol, endothelial dysfunction, pro-inflammatory cytokines, allostatic load, and cardiovascular diseases. Results and Conclusion: Herein we showed a link between cortisol, en-dothelial dysfunction, pro-inflammatory cytokines, and the incidence or prognosis of cardiovascular diseases in a psychosocial context of stress. Al-lostatic load index was also identified as a pertinent tool in the assessment of the cumulative psychosocial stressors' burden exerted on the body.