SERUM GLYCOPROTEIN HORMONES AND THEIR FREE ALPHA-SUBUNIT IN A HEALTHYELDERLY POPULATION SELECTED ACCORDING TO THE SENIEUR PROTOCOL - ANALYSES WITH ULTRASENSITIVE TIME-RESOLVED FLUOROIMMUNOASSAYS

The SENIEUR protocol was elaborated by a working party of European Com munity's Concerted Action Programme on Aging (EURAGE) to define strict admission criteria for 'healthy' elderly subjects and young controls for immunogerontological studies. This protocol, which is based on cas e history, laboratory values and drug consumption, intends to limit th e influence of underlying disease and/or medication in order to allow analyses of the aging process per se. In a group of 38 male and 37 fem ale individuals we determined the impact of age and classification acc ording to the SENIEUR protocol on luteinizing hormone (LH), follicle s timulating hormone (FSH), human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) and free glycoprotein hormone cr-subunit serum values. Analyses were performed by a set of ultrasensitive time-resolved immunofluorometric assays (IF MA) using our own panel of monoclonal antibodies (MCA). HLH and hFSH, but also hCG and free cu serum levels increased highly significantly w ith age in the female population (P < 0.001). In males hFSH, hLH hCG a nd the free alpha-subunit increased with age. However, only the rise o f hFSH and of Free oc was statistically significant (P < 0.01). The in fluence of the SENIEUR status on the respective hormone serum levels w as determined using two factor analysis of variance, which revealed no statistically significant difference (P > 0.01) between SENIEUR and N ON-SENIEUR individuals for all four analytes in both sexes. We conclud e that the age related increase of hLH, hFSH, hCG and free alpha is an intrinsic age-dependent phenomen and is not modified by or due to und erlying disease or medication as demonstrated by analyses of SENIEUR i ndividuals. Since SENIEUR and NON-SENIEUR individuals had comparable h ormone values, a randomly chosen, 'apparently healthy' population seem s to be sufficient for physiological studies on serum GPH levels. Last ly, these age related hormonal changes in an extremely well defined he althy population underline the need for age adjusted 'normal' hormone values as elaborated in this communication.