Acute stress may induce ovulation in women

Table 2 Effect of hormone treatment on HPA axis response to acute stress.

Species	Stressor	Hormone treatment	HPA axis response	References
Rats	20-min restraint	Estradiol vs oil and estradiol plus progesterone	Increased	[39]
	Exposition to a novel environment	Estradiol and estradiol plus progesterone vs no hormone treatment and progesterone	Increased	[40]
	5-sec footshock	Estradiol vs no hormone treatment	Increased	[54]
	1-min exposure to ether vapors	Estradiol vs no hormone treatment	Increased	[54]
Rhesus monkeys	30-min intracerebroventricular infusion of interleukin-1α	Estradiol at doses resulting in the typical high levels of plasma estradiol that reproduce the late follicular phase	Increased	[56]
		Estradiol at doses resulting in low levels of plasma estradiol	Increased	[57]
		Estradiol at doses that results in intermediate levels of plasma estradiol that reproduce the early-mid follicular phase	Inhibited	[57]
Women	Single intravenous injection of endotoxin	Estradiol vs no hormone treatment	No treatment effect	[35]
	Psychological stress (speech and math tasks)	Estrogens or estrogens plus progestogen vs no hormone treatment	No treatment effect	[58]
		Estradiol vs the same women before treatment	Decreased	[59]
	Psychological stress (mental arithmetic tasks accompanied by a repetitive annoying background noise	Estradiol vs placebo	Decreased	[60]

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