Endocrine Abstracts

Since more than 40 years growth hormone (GH) measurement has been possible by immunoassay techniques. Although these methods have greatly augmented the diagnostic tools of endocrinologists following patients with GH-related disorders, their use has also brought about confusion and left uncertainties.Cut-off levels for dynamic GH tests in the diagnosis of both GH deficiency and acromegaly have to be considered arbitrary, since different commercial hGH ass...

Performance enhancing substances enjoy considerable popularity among athletes, particularly if deemed undetectable. Doping with growth hormone has been considered undetectable until recently. Two strategies have been pursued to detect GH doping: Pharmacological endpoints and GH isoform composition.For the former approach the consortium GH 2000/2004 has identified markers of GH action and found a combination of parameters from the IGF-system and collagen ...

Performance enhancing substances enjoy considerable popularity among athletes, particularly if deemed undetectable. Doping with growth hormone has been considered undetectable until recently. Two strategies have been pursued to detect GH doping: Pharmacological endpoints and GH isoform composition.For the former approach the consortium GH 2000/2004 has identified markers of GH action and found a combination of parameters from the IGF-system and collagen ...

Pegvisomant is a specific GH antagonist developed for the treatment of acromegaly. Pegvisomant is a GH antagonist molecule with an amino acid substitution that blocks the conformational change necessary for signal transduction and polyethylene glycol (PEG) moieties to improve clinical efficacy. Pegvisomant has a long plasma half-life and its mode of clearance has not been established. We hypothesised that GHR mediated internalisation of Pegvisomant might be one mechanism for i...

Background: Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is a rare solid tumor with poor prognosis in advanced stages. The adrenolytic drug mitotane and cytotoxic chemotherapies are current treatment options with limited clinical efficacy. Animal experiments pointed to an adrenotoxic effect of sunitinib suggesting potential antineoplastic activity in ACC.Study population: Thirty-eight patients with advanced ACC progressing after mitotane and 1–3 cytotoxic chemoth...

The leptin receptor (ObR) exists in multiple isoforms. In humans, there is no mRNA encoding soluble receptor (LBP). We investigated the hypothesis that human LBP can be generated by proteolytic cleavage of membrane anchored leptin receptors (ObRb and ObRa). LBP, of similar size to that previously detected in human serum, was detected in medium of cells transfected with ObRa by HPLC, Immunofluorometric assay, and Ligand mediated immunofluorometric assay, but not by ELISA. The L...