Endocrine Abstracts

Ghrelin is a recently discovered endogenous ligand of the Growth Hormone (GH) secretagogue receptor, and is primarily produced by the stomach. Ghrelin acts on the hypothalamic-pituitary axis to stimulate GH release and may determine hepatic sensitivity of Insulin-like Growth Factor-I (IGF-I) to GH. Maternal chronic cold exposure by winter shearing has shown to increase lamb birth weight, however, the effects on Ghrelin are not yet known.Twenty-six multip...

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Maternal nutrient restriction at specific gestational stages compromises fetal growth and development, in particular, fetal adipose tissue deposition. The extent to which nutritional supplementation can promote growth and development of specific fetal organs is unknown. This study aimed to determine whether protein supplementation of the maternal diet at defined stages of gestation promoted the abundance of the key mitochondrial proteins; uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1), cytochrom...

Epidemiological studies have shown that infants of low birth weight show poor neonatal growth and increased susceptibility to adult diseases such as diabetes in later life. Pigs provide an ideal model to examine the influence of size at birth due to the natural variance in piglet weight within a litter. This study examined whether birth weight influences the expression of UCP3 and it's regulation by thyroid hormones in neonatal pigs.Piglets from 11 litte...

Autogel is a long-acting formulation of the somatostatin analogue lanreotide, and is effective against the symptoms of acromegaly when given by monthly deep s.c. injection. This open, Phase III, multicentre study assessed the pharmacokinetic (PK) and population PK/pharmacodynamic profile of lanreotide Autogel in patients with acromegaly who had previously received the prolonged-release (PR) formulation of lanreotide, 30mg microparticle depot formulation, given i.m.<p class...

QLS-H is a new, weighted QoL questionnaire developed for patients with hypopituitarism. We evaluated QLS-H data from UK patients in the HypoCCs International surveillance study, and compared results with a sample of the general UK population (n=1090).The QLS-H questionnaire was administered at baseline and at yearly intervals. Scores were corrected for age and gender differences, and expressed as Z-scores based on UK-specific reference ranges. Using this...