Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Nonclassic congenital adrenal hyperplasia (NCAH) is a condition associated with adrenal masses and suggested by current European guidelines to be considered in case of bilateral adrenal lesions. NCAH is caused by different mutations in the CYP21A2 gene coding for the 21-hydoxylase enzyme in the glucocorticoid synthesis leading to mild cortisol deficiency and elevated androgen and steroid precursor levels. 17-hydroxyprogesterone (17OHP) is the most importan...

Background: Resource-saving and medically safe investigations of adrenal incidentaloma (AI) is one of the challenges in modern endocrinology. The absolutely majority of AIs are benign and hormonally inactive. Mild hypercortisolemia is the most common finding in hormonally active AI and is often referred to as subclinical Cushing syndrome (SCS). SCS is associated with increased risk of type 2 diabetes, poorly regulated hypertension, osteoporosis and cardiovascular disease. Ther...

Background: Adrenal incidentalomas (AI) are common and reported at frequencies of 2-10% at CT-scans of the abdomen. It is established that the number of diagnosed and investigated cases of AI have increased over the last decades. This increase is closely related to the development of modern radiology. General access of CT scanners with higher performance have led to an improved capacity and consequently more performed investigations. Other contributing factors are improved ima...

Objective: Preoperative iodine therapy due to toxic nodular goiter (TNG) is discouraged as iodine may cause an aggravation of hyperthyroidism. In Graves’ disease iodine has been used for a century but little data is available on iodine treatment in TNG. We aimed to examine if a short course of iodine treatment is safe to administer in TNG.Method: 20 patients with TNG with persistent subclinical to mild hyperthyroidism were included at our tertiary c...

Background: It is not known if non-functional adrenal adenomas (NFAA) are associated with increased mortality.Objective: To investigate mortality in patients with NFAA and compare with matched controls. Design: Retrospective register-based national cohort study.Methods: Patients diagnosed with NFAA in Sweden 2005-2019 were identified and followed until death or 2020. For each case, four age/sex/municipality-m...

Background: The nature of adrenal tumors can occasionally be difficult to determine using only laboratory and radiological findings. In those rare cases, obtaining a cytological sample by fine needle aspiration (FNA) can be valuable. Transabdominal ultrasound, endoscopic ultrasound (EUS), and computerized tomography (CT) guided biopsy are the most used methods for obtaining a cytological sample from an adrenal lesion.Methods: Adrenal FNAs performed betwe...

Importance: It is not known if non-functional adrenal tumors (NFATs) are associated with dementia.Objective: To analyze incidence and prevalence of dementia in individuals with NFAT.Design, setting and participants: A national retrospective register-based study in patients with NFAT diagnosed in Sweden 2005–2019 and controls without adrenal tumors followed until death or end of 2019 was conducted. Individuals with a diagnosis ...

Adrenal tumors (ATs) are uncommon in children and adolescents. The aim of this nation-wide retrospective registry-based cohort study was to characterise the various ATs in this population and demonstrate their differences from ATs in adults. All patients under the age of 21 in Sweden with verified adrenal lesions according to ICD-codes between 2005 and 2019 were identified in linked nation-wide registries. Out of the total 232 patients, 121 (52.2%) were boys, with boy predomin...

Importance: It is unclear if non-functional adrenal tumors (NFAT) are associated with higher cancer incidence.Objective: To analyze the cancer incidence in patients with NFAT.Design, Settings and Participants: A national retrospective register-based study involving cases with NFAT diagnosed in Sweden 2005-2019 and controls was conducted. Both cases and controls were followed until death or 2020. Individuals with diagnosed adrenal h...

Introduction: Pheochromocytomas (PHEO) and paragangliomas (PGL) - (PPGLs) are neuroendocrine tumors derived from chromaffin cells of the adrenal medulla or extraadrenal nonchromaffinic tissue, respectively. PPGLs occur in 0.05% to 0.1% of patients with secondary hypertension. Chromogranin A (CgA) is the main non-specific biomarker of neuroendocrine tumors. It is produced and secreted into the blood by endo- and neuroendocrine cells of various organs (e.g., adrenal glands). The...