Endocrine Abstracts

A 41 year old woman presented with a 4 month history of oropharyngeal spasms precipitated by eating, yawning or talking. Such manouvres caused her to fear for her life due to profound choking and 'going blue';as a result she had stopped eating. On direct questioning she complained of circumoral tingling, paraesthesia and carpopedal spasm. She described profuse diarrhoea over the preceding year and had lost 15 kilograms. She was taking no drugs to interfere ith calcium homeosta...

Adverse effects of steroid excess on bone metabolism are well established but presentation of Cushing's syndrome with metabolic bone disease is reported to be uncommon. We describe a case of Cushing's syndrome presenting with pathological fractures probably present for 8 years before diagnosis.A 33 year old nurse first sustained spontaneous stress fractures of her metatarsals in 1994, with repeated fractures occurring up to 2002. In 2001 she developed hypertension, acute l...

Shapiro's syndrome is characterised by agenesis of the corpus callosum, hypothermia and hyperhydrosis. We report a case associated with abnormal water balance and hypothalamic dysfunction.A 20 year old Turkish Cypriot man presented with an 8 month history of profuse sweating associated with a perception of extreme cold. He described progressive problems with speech, memory and clumsiness on walking. Symptoms of polyuria and polydipsia were associated wit...