Endocrine Abstracts

A 20-year-old gentleman with an established diagnosis of Chronic fatigue syndrome was admitted to hospital with palpitations and shortness of breath on exertion. He had been taking ‘healthy supplements’ for his ME for a year. On examination, he was noted to be tachycardic with a heart rate of 120–150 beats/minute. ECG confirmed sinus tachycardia. Further investigations revealed a free thyroxine (fT4) of 29.4 pmol/l and thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH...

A 21-year-old female patient was referred from the eye clinic after she was noted to have bilateral papilloedema during a routine eye examination. She gave a 3 months history of intermittent headaches and fleeting episodes of profuse sweating and rash, unrelated to the headaches. She had been investigated by the GP with routine blood tests which were found to be normal.On examination, she was noted to be tachycardic at 100 beats/min and hypertensive at 1...

Pituitary apoplexy is uncommon and the incidence is quoted to be between 5 and 16% in pre-existing pituitary adenomas. Recurrent pituitary apoplexy is rarer; we report 2 such cases.A 22-year-old female underwent transsphenoidal resection of an expanding intrasellar lesion in 1987. She was commenced on hydrocortisone for cortisol deficiency and on subsequent follow-up, on thyroxine. She required repeated surgery in 2003 and 2005 after she presented with h...

A 75-year old gentleman presented with symptoms of increasing lethargy, loss of appetite associated with weight loss and constant micturition. A CT scan showed extensive peritoneal mass in the lower abdomen and pelvis with disseminated intraperitoneal malignancy. A CT guided biopsy confirmed a poorly differentiated tumour. Immunohistochemistry showed that all the cytokeratin markers were negative, but vimentin was positive and CD117 (c-kit) was strongly positive, indicating th...

A 23-year-old man initially presented to his GP with palpable ‘gland in his neck’ for 9 years. He was otherwise well with no medical problems. He has a family history of hypothyroidism. Examination revealed right submandibular gland enlargement and lymph nodes in the anterior cervical region bilaterally. His TPO antibody was negative and the only abnormal result was a raised TSH of 12.7. He was commenced on 50 μg of thyroxine daily. Ultrasound of the neck showed...

Background: Current UK guidelines for the Use of Thyroid Function Tests provide specific recommendations for the use of thyroid function tests in inpatients. Isolated alterations in TSH occur in 15% of inpatients and <2% will have underlying thyroid disorder. Thyroid function should be repeated every 4–6 weeks when changing thyroxine replacement dose or when commencing thionamides.Aim: To identify the indications and frequency of thyroid tests i...