Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Short Synacthen tests (SST) are both inconvenient and expensive, especially since the cost of tetracosactide recently increased 15-fold to over £45/ampule. A retrospective review was performed to see whether the number of SST’s could be reduced in our institution.Methods: All 76 adult inpatient (mean age 67) and 106 adult outpatient SST’s (mean age 50) from a 12-month period were reviewed for indication and whether a preceding ...

Background: Short Synacthen tests (SST) are inconvenient and expensive, especially since the cost of tetracosactide recently increased to over £45/ampule. Historic literature on the minimum 9 am cortisol required to avoid a SST ranges from 243 to 500 nmol/l and individual endocrinologist practice varies greatly.Methods: In an audit of all 182 SST’s from 1 year at our institution, either a previous 0900 h cortisol was recorded or the basal corti...