Endocrine Abstracts

Primary Aldosteronism (PA), due to a unilateral aldosterone-producing adenoma of the adrenal (APA), is the commonest curable cause of Hypertension, but the prospects for cure fall with age. APAs rarely increase in size, suggesting an origin much earlier than the development of resistant hypertension. Most APAs have gain-of-function somatic mutations which result in increased Ca2+ entry, and constitutive activation of aldosterone production. Women with larger APAs, a...

Primary Aldosteronism (PA), due to a unilateral aldosterone-producing adenoma of the adrenal (APA), is the commonest curable cause of Hypertension, but the prospects for cure fall with age. APAs rarely increase in size, suggesting an origin much earlier than the development of resistant hypertension. Most APAs have gain-of-function somatic mutations which result in increased Ca2+ entry, and constitutive activation of aldosterone production. Women with larger APAs, a...

Case presentation to demonstrate the presentation and treatment of patients with Thyroid Associated Orbitopathy with particular reference to the role of the Endocrine Nurse in their management.Declaration of interest: There is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research reported.Funding: No specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sector.<...

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is characterized by major disturbances in lipids as well as the defining abnormalities in glucose. In spite of this, our understanding of the control of lipid metabolism is incomplete. In particular, the relative contribution of insulin compared to other regulatory inputs to the determination of liver and total body adiposity is unclear. We have used a loss of function approach to study the requirement for a major downstream target of insulin, t...

Permanent hypoparathyroidism is rare after total thyroidectomy. However, our experience is that often patients remain on alfacalcidol and calcium supplements long-term after thyroidectomy.Administration of these drugs can result in complications such as hypercalcaemia, hypercalciuria, nephrocalcinosis and vitamin D toxicity.Case histories will be used to demonstrate that withdrawal of alfacalcidol should be attempted post thyroidec...

Radioiodide therapy of thyroid cancer represents the most effective form of systemic radiotherapy available to the clinician today. The ability of thyroid cancer cells to concentrate iodide is induced by expression in the follicular cell membrane of the sodium iodide symporter, NIS. Some thyroid cancers lack expression of this protein and therefore the ability to concentrate iodide, making them insensitive to 131-I therapy. Several investigators have characterized the expressi...

Background: Klinefelter’s syndrome (KS) is a genetic condition affecting men with the potential to severely reduce their testosterone levels and affect their physical appearance. Being a syndrome there are a variety of different symptoms which individuals may experience to a great or lesser extent. While much research has been directed at understanding the cognitive impact of KS much less research has been undertaken considering the psycho-social impact of living with the...

Background: Evidence from a Needs Analysis (2006) and Patient Satisfaction Survey (2008) for people with pituitary conditions, suggested infertility was a key yet unexpected problem for the majority of respondents. Being infertile without the co-morbidity of having a pituitary condition confers a huge emotional burden on the couple concerned. The aim of this study was to explore in detail the effects infertility imposed on people with a pituitary condition.<p class="abstex...

Background: Klinefelter’s syndrome (KS) is a genetic condition affecting men with the potential to severely reduce their testosterone levels and affect their physical appearance. Being a syndrome there are a variety of different symptoms, which individuals may experience to a great or lesser extent. While much research has been directed at understanding the cognitive impact of KS much less research has been undertaken considering the psycho-social impact of living with th...

Background: Evidence from a Needs Analysis (2006) and Patient Satisfaction Survey (2008) for people with pituitary conditions suggested infertility was a key yet unexpected problem for the majority of respondents. Being infertile without the co-morbidity of pituitary condition confers a huge emotional burden on the individual. The aim of this piece of research was to investigate individual’s perceptions of managing infertility following a diagnosis of a pituitary conditio...