Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Adrenal tumours are often benign and non-functioning. However, there can be underlying phaeochromocytoma, Conns, adrenal Cushing or even malignancy in some cases. It is therefore imperative that these incidentalomas are promptly investigated once detected and managed accordingly.Aim: 1. To determine the incidence of adrenal incidentaloma at Gozo General Hospital. 2. To determine the adherence of management of incidentalomas to guidelines reco...

Introduction: The repercussions of long-term exposure to low level mixtures of endocrine disrupting compounds (EDCs) which are present, ubiquitously, in the environment are not well understood. Heat-treated sewage sludge, an EDC-rich product used as fertiliser, has been shown to compromise testicular and ovarian development. However, to date, there has been limited investigation in exposed animals of the adrenal glands, the steroid hormone products of which play key roles in f...

Objective: To assess the metabolic characteristics, body composition, Insulin resistance and energy expenditure in young South Indian males with low and normal birth weight.Methodology: A population based cohort of 43 low birth weight (<2.5 kg) and 41 normal birth weight (>2.5 kg) subjects born at term was taken from a rural part in the South Indian state of Tamilnadu. Young healthy males aged 18–22 years were recruited. Following informed c...

Background: Intensive glycemic control forms the benchmark of management of type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) and is limited by the risk of hypoglycaemia. Repeated episodes of hypoglycaemia can lead to development of hypoglycaemia unawareness and a sixfold increase in deaths in those experiencing severe hypoglycaemia. Severe hypoglycaemia occurs in 35–42% patients with T1DM. However, there is lack of data from our population and hence we aimed to objectively estimate the pr...

Hypoglycaemia – especially in elderly hospital in-patients – is far less uncommon in non-diabetic patients than was previously thought but is only very rarely due to accidental or malicious ‘insulin’ (including insulin analogues and sulphonylurea) administration. The question of when to suspect that this might be the case and how to confirm or refute it is one that crops up from time to time in every community. Sometimes it is relatively simple and easy to ...

The ability of thyroid cells to specifically uptake radioiodine is frequently compromised in the neoplastic setting, particularly in older patients with poorly differentiated thyroid cancer and larger metastases, resulting in a 10-year survival rate of less than 10%. The mechanisms which govern cellular iodide uptake via the sodium iodide symporter (NIS) have been elucidated with increasing molecular clarity over the past 35 years. NIS is regulated in a tissue-specific manner,...