Searchable abstracts of presentations at key conferences in endocrinology
Endocrine Abstracts (2010) 22 P532

1Endocrinology and Nutrition Department, Hospital General Universitario, Alicante, Spain; 2Clinical analysis Department, Hospital Naval, Cartagena, Spain; 3Hormone Laboratory, Hospital General Universitario, Alicante, Spain.


Introduction: Salivary testosterone (Sal-T) reflects the plasma free testosterone fraction that can flow passively through the salivary glands and appears to be a strong correlation with the Calculated free testosterone (CFT) in both eugonadal and hypogonadal men. Since the collection of saliva is simple, noninvasive and inexpensive, the Sal-T is a promising tool for the screening of hypogonadism. Despite the initial interest that Sal-T has aroused, new clinical studies are needed for validation.

Objective: i) To establish the reliability of the determination of Sal-T in the diagnosis of male hypogonadism. ii) To determine the sensitivity and specificity of Sal-T for the diagnosis of hypogonadism in men using CFT as gold standard.

Methods: Cross-sectional study. Sequential sampling. Inclusion criteria: eugonadal men or with clinical suspicion of hypogonadism. Sample size: 137 individuals. Statistical analysis (SPSS 15.0.) Spearman correlation between CFT and Sal-T in the different groups evaluated. Calculating sensitivity and specificity of Sal-Tusing CFT as gold standard.

Results: We studied 137 men: 123 eugonadal (age 18–44 years, BMI 24±3) 14 hypogonadal (age 18–77 years, BMI 24±3). The correlation between CFT and Sal-T in eugonadal population was 0.53, while in hypogonadal population fell to 0.31. The Sal-T had a 36% of sensitivity and 98% of specificity; positive predictive value and negative predictive value were 63 and 93%, respectively.

Conclusions: i) Sal-T had a strong correlation with CFT in eugonadal population, being weak in hypogonadal population. ii) Sal-T presented a high specificity and low sensitivity in the diagnosis of hypogonadism.

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