Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: An aim of the ERNs is empowering patients, by education & learning about their experiences after diagnosis of a rare endocrine disease (RED), to identify gaps and improve outcome. Thus, EndoERN Work Package 4 designed a survey, to learn about patients perceptions on quality of care and existing gaps in diagnosis/management.Aim: Evaluate results of a 21 question survey answered on-line on a Likert scale by individual patients with RED or...

Background: Current guidelines recommend that susceptible patients should be tested and treated for AGHD. Still, it is not universally recognised as a distinct entity and reimbursement of GH replacement therapy is not available in some countries.Aim: 1) to record current practice of AGHD management throughout Europe and benchmark it against existing guidelines, 2) to evaluate educational status of health care professionals.Patients...

Introduction: Cushing’s syndrome (CS) has been associated with low quality of life, even after biochemical cure. However little data is available on long term follow-up. The aim of the study was to analyse 10-year follow-up of quality of life (QoL) in patients in remission of CS.Methods: 24 patients in remission of CS followed in Hospital Sant Pau were included in this study (3 men, 21 pituitary origin, 3 adrenal; mean baseline age 45.1 ± 14.1...

The ERCUSYN (European Registry on Cushing’s syndrome (CS)) study is a project funded by the European Commission Public Health Program (PHP 800200), of which the ESE is one of the 41 Partners from 25 countries. The aims include obtaining prospective and follow-up data at EU level on epidemiology, mortality, outcome of therapies, co-morbidities, assessment of diagnostic and therapeutic strategies, quality of life evaluation using a disease-generated questionnaire (CushingQo...

The Spanish acromegaly registry (REA) is an online epidemiological database created in 1997 to collect clinical and biochemical data of patients with acromegaly followed in Spain.Aim: To study trends in acromegaly treatment over time in Spain.Methods: REA is an online database in which registered endocrinologists collect data from all acromegalic patients seen at their practices in Spain. In the last year the neuroendocrine group o...

Objective: To assess if weekly administration of 40 mg pegvisomant (PEG-V) improves quality of life (QoL) and metabolic parameters in acromegalic patients with already normal age-adjusted insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) concentrations during long-acting somatostatin analog (SSA) treatment.Design: Prospective investigator-initiated, double blind, placebo controlled, cross-over study. Twenty acromegalic subjects received for two consecutive treatment ...

Introduction: Cushing’s disease (CD) and acromegaly, despite their different specific symptoms, often present psychopathology (mainly depression and anxiety) even after hormonal normalization. However, their psychopathological profiles may be different. The aim of this study was to analyse the psychopathological profile in successfully treated Acromegaly and CD, and to compare both diseases. Current hormonal evaluation and time since endocrine control will also be analyse...

Introduction: Previous results of our group, presented in the ECE last year, showed a lower gene expression of proconvertase PC1/3, involved in the processing of POMC, in silent corticotroph tumors (sCT) than in functioning ones (fCT), overall and in microadenomas. The aim of the present study was to quantify the protein expression of convertases involved in the processing of POMC (PC1/3) and in the degradation of ACTH (PC2, CPE and PAM) in a series of CT.</p...

Introduction: Hypertension (HTN) is a major cardiovascular (CV) risk factor and independent predictor of the increased mortality in patients with acromegaly. Surgical cure of acromegaly is associated with improvement in blood pressure (BP) levels, however little is known on the effect of pegvisomant (PEGV) treatment on HTN.Methods/design: ACROSTUDY is an open-label, international, prospective, non-interventional study monitoring the long-term safety of P...

Introduction: Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is a protein that has been linked to several cardiovascular risk factors and bone status. Stress and corticosteroid exposure can affect BDNF levels, although this has never been studied in Cushing’s syndrome (CS). The aims of this study were to establish if BDNF levels were reduced in CS and to check possible associations to cardiovascular risk factors and bone status.Methods: 52 patients (18 ac...