Skin reactions to histamine of healthy subjects after hypnotically inducedemotions of sadness, anger, and happiness

Background: The severity of symptoms in asthma and other hypersensitivity-r elated disorders has been associated with changes in mood but little is kno wn about the mechanisms possibly mediating such a relationship. The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of mood on skin reactivity to h istamine by comparing the effects of hypnotically induced emotions on flare and wheal reactions to cutaneous histamine prick tests. Methods: Fifteen highly hypnotically susceptible volunteers had their cutan eous reactivity to histamine measured before hypnosis at 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, and 15 min after the histamine prick. These measurements were repeated und er three hypnotically induced emotions of sadness, anger, and happiness pre sented in a counterbalanced order. Skin reactions were measured as change i n histamine flare and wheal area in mm(2) per minute. Results: The increase in flare reaction in the time interval from I to 3 mi n during happiness and anger was significantly smaller than flare reactions during sadness (P < 0.05). No effect of emotion was found for wheal reacti ons. Hypnotic susceptibility scores were associated with increased flare re actions at baseline (r = 0.56; P < 0.05) and during the condition of happin ess (r = 0.56; P < 0.05). Conclusions: Our results agree with previous studies showing mood to be a p redictor of cutaneous immediate-type hypersensitivity and histamine skin re actions. The results are also in concordance with earlier findings of an as sociation between hypnotic susceptibility and increased reactivity to an al lergen.