Salivary oxytocin in autistic patients and in patients with intellectual disability

Yulia A Pichugina; Irina V Maksimova; Marina A Berezovskaya; Natalya A Afanaseva; Aleksey B Pichugin; Diana V Dmitrenko; Elena E Timechko; Alla B Salmina; Olga L Lopatina

doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2022.969674

Salivary oxytocin in autistic patients and in patients with intellectual disability

Front Psychiatry. 2022 Nov 24:13:969674. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.969674. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychiatry and Narcology, Prof. V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russia.
² Social Neuroscience Laboratory, Prof. V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russia.
³ Department of Medical Genetics of Clinical Neurophysiology, Institute of Postgraduate Education, Prof. V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russia.
⁴ Medical Genetic Laboratory, Prof. V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russia.
⁵ Laboratory of Experimental Brain Cytology, Department of Brain Studies, Research Center of Neurology, Moscow, Russia.
⁶ Research Institute of Molecular Medicine and Pathobiochemistry, Prof. V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russia.
⁷ Department of Biochemistry, Medical, Pharmaceutical and Toxicological Chemistry, Prof. V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russia.

Abstract

Background: Assessing the role of oxytocin (OT) in the regulation of social interaction is a promising area that opens up new opportunities for studying the mechanisms of developing autism spectrum disorders (ASD).

Aim: To assess the correlation between the salivary OT level and age-related and psychopathological symptoms of children with intellectual disability (ID) and ASD.

Methods: We used the clinical and psychopathological method to assess the signs of ASD based on International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10), the severity of ASD was specified by the selected Russian type version "Childhood Autism Rating Scale" (CARS). Patients of both groups had an IQ score below 70 points.

Results: The median and interquartile range of salivary OT levels in patients with ID and ASD were 23.897 [14.260-59.643] pg/mL, and in the group ID without ASD - Me = 50.896 [33.502-83.774] pg/mL (p = 0.001). The severity of ASD on the CARS scale Me = 51.5 [40.75-56.0] score in the group ID with ASD, and in the group ID without ASD-at the level of Me = 32 [27.0-38.0] points (p < 0.001). According to the results of correlation-regression analysis in the main group, a direct correlation was established between salivary OT level and a high degree of severity of ASD Rho = 0.435 (p = 0.005). There was no correlation between the salivary OT level and intellectual development in the group ID with ASD, Rho = 0.013 (p = 0.941) and we have found a relationship between oxytocin and intellectual development in the group ID without ASD, Rho = 0.297 (p = 0.005). There was no correlation between salivary OT and age, ASD and age.

Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that patients in the group ID with ASD demonstrated a lower level of salivary OT concentration and a direct relationship between the maximum values of this indicator and the severity of autistic disorders, in contrast to patients in the group ID without ASD.

Keywords: autism spectrum disorders; behavior; childhood age; intellectual disability; oxytocin.