Anti-stress relaxation
Stress: how it affects cortisol
MedikalBeauty Institute deals with people's all-round wellbeing, laying the foundations for a psychophysical wellbeing that cannot ignore the need for relaxation and anti-stress treatments that the hectic and stressful lifestyle that has accompanied us for years now makes necessary to improve people's health and living conditions.
CORTISOL THE STRESS HORMONE
Stress is an adaptive effort of the body to a different situation and generally unfavourable to the personal state of the person at that time. This effort may, in some cases, be favourable, but generally, especially with the current pace of life, it proves to be negative, chronic and degenerative. Stress in fact stimulates our body to produce more Cortisola hormone produced by the adrenal gland stimulated by the release of the pituitary hormone ACTH, which is the precursor of Cortisol. Stress can be a temporary condition or one that persists over time and can be induced by various factors, let's look at some of them:
- personal, family, work problems
- a lifestyle that is too intense for one's body, both mental and physical hyperactivity
- excessive physical training
- bereavement, loss or traumatic events
- excessive sense of responsibility
Functions of cortisol
Cortisol is a hormone; it tends to inhibit bodily functions that are not essential in the short term, ensuring maximum support for vital organs:
- induces an increase in cardiac output
- increases blood glucose by increasing hepatic gluconeogenesis, stimulating glucagon secretion and decreasing insulin receptor activity
- reduces the immune defences and therefore decreases the ability to react to inflammation
- decreases collagen and bone matrix synthesis, accelerating osteopenia and osteoporosis
- promotes protein catabolism, in practice stimulating the conversion of proteins into glucose and glycogen synthesis.
- stimulates the utilisation of fatty acids and lipogenesis, i.e. the transformation of carbohydrates into fat
Cortisol therefore has an important influence on our organism and it is therefore important to keep its value under control, to prevent overproduction due to stress and other factors that we will see later, from becoming a pathology (Cushing's disease).
Other factors that increase cortisol
Overweight and malnutrition
Both overweight and underweight conditions increase cortisol. In the case of overweight, cortisol increases due to increased inflammation in the body, while in the case of malnutrition, cortisol increases in order to ensure the survival of the body, inducing muscle catabolism.
Prolonged fasting or poor eating habits
e.g. skipping breakfast or eating a lot in a single daily meal promotes increased cortisol production
Power supply
a high Cortisol level is associated with a high carbohydrate intake, which promotes a rise in blood sugar levels resulting in reactive hypoglycaemia due to excessive insulin stimulation, thus triggering Cortisol production.
Smoke
nicotine has a negative effect on metabolism creating imbalances such as hypercortisolism as well as hypercholesterolaemia, hyperglycaemia, hypertension
Sedentariness
lack of movement induces greater production of Cortisol
Physical activity
Cortisol secretion is correlated with the duration and intensity of exercise; the more these factors increase, the greater the amount of Cortisol produced. In fact, it is well known that ACTH increases already in the pre-race period, caused by the psychological stress of competition.
Drugs
Cortisol overproduction can be caused by the use of cortisone drugs, which are usually used to reduce inflammatory states due to allergies, arthritis, rheumatism, trauma, asthma and are administered under strict medical supervision
For your beauty
MedikalBeauty Institute offers customised relaxation and anti-stress protocols that include a preliminary evaluation check-up to assess each individual's needs, lifestyle and habits. Based on these factors, a customised protocol is drawn up, with medical check-up, dietary advice and targeted medical aesthetic treatments 1
MedikalBeauty Institute's recommendations are:
DIET: a healthy, balanced diet helps to keep Cortisol levels under control it is advisable to eat moderate calorie and frequent meals, approximately 5 per day 2.
We recommend, as a general rule, starting the day with a good breakfast, possibly including complex carbohydrates such as oats, sugar-free cereals, and wholemeal flours, and at mealtimes favouring protein intake with a high biological and protein value such as eggs, white meat, low-fat cheese, milk, fish, limiting sweets, avoiding or limiting the consumption of snacks, crisps and the like, alcohol, sweet drinks, fruit juices, and soft drinks.
PHYSICAL ACTIVITY: moderate physical activity, such as a 1-hour walk a day, is useful for managing stress and regulating Cortisol production
REST: allow yourself fair periods of rest, respect sleeping hours to regenerate your organism, try not to lie down too late at night.
LIFESTYLE: taking quality time, engaging in activities we enjoy
The Cushing's diseaseis a pathology due to an overproduction of Cortisol and leads to several problems, let's see which ones:
- Hypertension
- Hirsutism and alopecia
- Truncular obesity is excess fat that accumulates mostly in the trunk while the limbs remain thin. The adipose tissue is deposited in specific and characteristic areas of the disease, such as the cervical region, supraclavicular dimples, in the cheeks and in the temporal region, resulting in the characteristic moon face. The fat is sometimes also deposited at the orbital level, in which case it can favour the formation of exophthalmosas well as can accumulate in the epidural space contributing to the development of neurological deficits
- Muscle weaknessFat accumulation as described above is related to myopathy and hypotrophy of muscle tissue. The atrophy of the muscle fibres, and the reduced production of proteins induced by the excess of glycocorticoids including Cortisol, are characteristic factors of Cushing's syndrome, This muscular suffering manifests itself in the difficulty of performing certain specific movements, such as getting up from a chair without support.
- Menstrual cycle alterations, hypoprogesteronism and related disorders in women
- Decline in libido
- Edema
- Recurrent infections
- Impaired glucose tolerance
- Type 2 diabetes
- Thin skin on the face
- Osteoporosis and brittle bone
- Headache
- Depression
- Acne
- Dyslipidaemia
- Delayed wound healing
- Psychosis
taking time to dedicate to ourselves* with targeted treatments in a comfortable environment let's take a look at some of them:
- COCOON
- LIPOSALINE
- FANGOMASSAGE
- RELAXING DECONTRACTING MYORELAXING MANUAL MASSAGES
- THERMOSALINES
- THERMOTALASSO
- OILMASSAGE
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