Allostatic Load

**Semantic type:** Health Care Activity

**Definition:** A physiological measure of the cumulative burden of stress on the body that can be assessed by biomarkers of physiological dysregulation. It is a type of biological risk which leads to poor health and maladaptive trajectories. It may be measured by assessing primary chemical mediators of stress which may include levels of dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate, cortisol, epinephrine, and norepinephrine, and their secondary outcomes which include systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, waist-hip ratio, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, total cholesterol, and glycated hemoglobin.