The Relationship of Serum Oxytocin Levels with Sexual Function and Depression: A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

Inconsistent results were found on the relationship of human blood Oxytocin (OXT) levels with psychiatric and sexual dysfunction (SD) in different studies. The present study aimed to determine the relationship of OXT levels with sexual function and depression. This was a cross-sectional study involving 84 non-pregnant healthy married women at childbearing. Beck Depression Inventory and Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI) were used to collect data and human oxytocin ELISA kit was used to determine serum OXT level. The independent t-test and Pearson correlation coefficient were used to determine the relationship between variables. Average age of the participants was 36.1 (6.91) in this study and range of their age was 19-49. Mean serum OXT level was 192.70 (139.71) pg/ml. The mean total score of FSFI and depression were 21.54 (5.18) and 12.42 (11.20) from the attainable score of 2-36 and 0-63, respectively. The associations between serum OXT level with FSFI overall score (r=0.066, P=0.548), and depression score (r=0.137, P=0.215) were not significant. No statistically significant differences were also found between two groups of women with and without SD (P=0.155) and women with and without depression (P=0.110) in terms of serum OXT levels. The results of this study did not indicate the significant relationship of serum OXT levels with depression and sexual function. As there was no significant relationship between the oxytocin concentrations and measured outcomes, conducting of further studies with stronger study design and larger sample size is recommended.