Chronic psychological stress is known to influence immune function and contribute to development of autoimmune disorders through dysregulated inflammatory responses. This study investigates relationships between acute stress, life trauma, and autoimmune salivary biomarkers in firefighter recruits during psychophysical stress training. Salivary samples were collected from firefighter recruits during two stress tests to evaluate responses to acute stress. Samples were obtained at three time points—pre-stress, post-stress, and recovery—across both tests. Cortisol was measured to characterize acute stress response (ASR) profiles, while immune function was assessed through the analyzing C-reactive Protein (CRP), Complement C4 (C4), Pigment Epithelium Derived Factor (PEDF), and Serum Amyloid P (SAP). Results showed significant changes in CRP, C4, and PEDF after stress inoculation. Higher previous life trauma was associated with lower baseline cortisol (r = −0.489) and delay in cortisol recovery (r = 0.514), suggesting a learned biological response, potentially protective against stress-induced dysregulation. Cluster analysis revealed four distinct cortisol ASR profiles which were found to have significantly different past life trauma (p = 0.031). These findings suggest that trauma history influences stress biomarker dynamics, potentially reflecting individualized adaptive or maladaptive responses. The insights gained may inform strategies to enhance stress resilience and mitigate autoimmune risk among high-stress populations.

Autoimmune disease (AD) is a breakdown of self-tolerance by the immune system and has a variety of clinical manifestations and complications across all organ systems. One of the targets for treatment of AD aims at reducing inflammation and upregulating factors that eliminate autoreactive cells. Intermittent fasting (IF) has recently gained popularity as a dietary intervention for weight management, but has also been found to interact and positively interfere with pathways involved in the pathophysiology of AD. Methods include searching in the PubMed and Google Scholar databases for reviews and clinical trials studying any relationships between AD and IF. The search results have identified a variety of anti-inflammatory effects IF has on the immune system that can potentially reduce AD severity and several trials specifically studying IF’s effects on type I diabetes (T1D), systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), rheumatoid arthritis (RA), inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and multiple sclerosis (MS). Based on the findings, IF has potential anti-inflammatory effects that could assist with decreasing AD severity. Future directions include studies to further determine safety and efficacy of IF with AD, broader investigations to include IF’s impact on a wide variety of ADs, an ideal time frame of how long patients should remain on IF, and any potential interactions IF may have on current drug therapies used to treat AD. This review also aims to encourage more human studies of IF and its application to AD given that many of these results are largely from in vitro, cellular and molecular, and animal studies.