Women with posttraumatic stress disorder have larger decreases in heart rate variability during stress tasks

The relationship between posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and high frequency heart rate variability (HF-HRV) was investigated during a resting baseline period and two 4-minute laboratory speech tasks. Participants were 20 women with PTSD and 20 age- and gender-matched controls. Parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) cardiac control was measured as HF-HRV (0.12-0.40 Hz) using power spectrum analysis. Participants with PTSD had significantly greater reductions in HF-HRV during two speech tasks (trauma recall and mental arithmetic) than control. These results suggest that PTSD is related to the magnitude of decrease in para-sympathetic cardiac control during stress in women. Health implications of altered PNS activity associated with PTSD deserve further study. (c) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.