Effects of total intravenous anesthesia with propofol on immuno-endocrine changes during surgical stress

Endocrine factors and cytokines are crucial to host responses to stress and infection. Because surgery is a major stressful condition, it is necessary to understand the influence of specific anesthetic procedures on immune-endocrine responses. The purpose of this study was to compare total intravenous anesthesia with propofol with conventional inhalational anesthesia on circulating cortisol, adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), prolactin, alpha-melanocyte-stimulating hormone (αMSH), and the cytokine, interleukin-6 (IL-6) in healthy patients undergoing tubal ligation. The results show that circulating cortisol was significantly suppressed ous propofol completely abolished the response of circulating cortisol to surgery. Because ACTH responses to surgery were similar in the two groups, the inhibition likely occurred directly on the adrenal glands. This study is the first to report the effects of anesthesia on circulating αMSH, which was decreased significantly after induction with both anesthetic techniques and was still depressed at 90 min in the propofol patients. Other aspects of immune-endocrine responses to surgery were similar irrespective of anesthetic type, which further suggests a specific suppression of adrenal function by propofol.