One centimetre of hair represents the accumulation effects of stress for approximately 1 month (Gow et al. 2010). In this way, cumulative stress reactivity of the past 3 months could be determined. Self-reported stress effects were assessed by the validated stress screener (Braam et al. 2009) and recovery problems after working time. The

need for recovery after work PLX3397 nmr was assessed by an 11-item instrument as described by De Croon et al. (2003). Participants P005091 filled in the questionnaire at the same time as the hair samples were collected. Saliva and hair analyses were performed at the laboratory of Prof. Dr. C. Kirschbaum in Dresden, Germany. The protocol for saliva analysis is described by Strahler et al. (2010), and the protocol for hair analysis by Kirschbaum et al. (2009). Participants without salivary cortisol data were excluded from the analyses. For the remaining data, missing individual salivary cortisol values were replaced by group means of the specific time of day. For the analyses, all salivary cortisol concentrations within subjects were summed to calculate an accumulated short-term

stress marker over a 3-day period. For the stress screener (min 0–max 6) and NFR (min 0–max 100), scale scores were calculated. Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r) was calculated between short-term and long-term cortisol excretion, and R 2 was calculated from there. Cohen’s criteria (Cohen 1998) for correlations were used: low when r = 0.1–0.3, moderate when r = 0.3–0.5, and high when r = 0.5–1.0. Furthermore, CAL-101 order Pearson’s correlations were calculated between short-and long-term cortisol excretion, self-reported stress, and NFR. For all analyses, the significance L-NAME HCl level was set at P < 0.05. Results are presented as means (±SD). Results Useful saliva measurements were collected from 37 workers, and useful hair

measurements were collected from 29 workers. Complete data were available from 27 participants. Among the participants, 81% were men and 19% were women. The average age of the participants was 46 (±10) years, and their average body mass index (BMI) was 26 (±4) kg/m2. Short-term cortisol excretion was on average (SD) 114.2 (±38.5) nmol/l. Long-term cortisol excretion was on average (SD) 15.4 (±8.7) pg/mg. Correlations are displayed in Table 1. Short-term and long-term cortisol excretion correlated significantly and moderately (r = 0.41, P = 0.03). The variation in short-term cortisol excretion explains about 17% of the variance in long-term cortisol excretion (R 2 = 0.17). Table 1 Correlations between need for recovery after work, stress complaints, short-term physiological stress effects and long-term physiological stress effects   Short-term cortisol excretion Stress complaints Need for recovery Long-term cortisol excretion r = 0.41 P = 0.03* n = 29 r = 0.12 P = 0.54 n = 28 r = 0.08 P = 0.70 n = 29 Short-term cortisol excretion   r = −0.04 P = 0.81 n = 36 r = 0.21 P = 0.