Endocrine Abstracts

Alterations in the thyroid axis have been reported following GH therapy both in adults and children with GH deficiency (GHD), even if the clinical significance of these changes, in small and short-term studies, remains uncertain. To evaluate the impact of GH replacement on thyroid status in a large selected cohort of prepubertal children with idiopathic GHD during a 3-years follow-up. Study outcome considered FT3, FT4 and TSH modifications (delta) during therapy and their corr...

Background: The Visceral Adiposity Index (VAI) has been suggested as a new gender-specific marker of visceral adipose dysfunction, strongly associated with insulin sensitivity in patients with cardio-metabolic risk.Aim: To test VAI in active acromegaly for the assessment of disease-associated metabolic risk evaluating its association with hormonal data, adipocytokine levels, insulin sensitivity and secretion parameters in a cohort of 27 subjects (15 M, 1...

Impaired GH secretion occurs in Cushing’s syndrome (CS), reflecting hypothalamic and pituitary alterations, without IGF-I impairment. Obesity is known to blunt GH release, leading to BMI-related tests for GHD. Evaluation of GH in CS after remission is difficult, due to chronic previous hypercortisolism and persistent overweight. Aim of this study was to evaluate in 22 patients with Cushing’s syndrome (16 Cushing disease, CD, 6 adrenal adenomas, CS) GH response to GHR...

Anaplastic Thyroid Carcinoma (ATC) is the most aggressive thyroid gland malignancy characterized by undifferentiated morphology. It has been suggested that cancer stem cells (CSCs) might play a central role in ATC. Previously on the basis of CD133 positivity, our group suggested that CD133+ cancer stem cells (CSCs) might play a central role in ATC. Here we analyzed a panel of different stem cell markers in order to identify a peculiar CSC pattern in ATC....

Interrelationships between HPA axis and sleep architecture are well documented and increased glucocorticoid levels seem associated with quantitative and qualitative sleep disruptions. The knowledge about sleep parameters in chronic hypercortisolism in humans is scanty. Our aim was to evaluate sleep efficiency in patients with Cushing’s syndrome (CS) at time of diagnosis, without ongoing specific therapy, using wrist actigraphy, a methodology that provides good estimations...