Endocrine Abstracts

Neuroendocrine neoplasms (NENs) are rare tumour showing a wide spectrum of clinical behaviours. Therapeutic options available for NET treatment are rarely curative and mostly palliative, as NETs frequently show resistance to pharmacological therapy. Cancers develop in complex tissue environments, which they depend on. Tumour-associated macrophages (TAMs) are a major cellular component of the tumour microenvironment. Two polarized state of macrophages are described in literatur...

Background: The fourth type of Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia (MEN) is a rare variant of MEN presenting a MEN1-like phenotype and originating from a germline mutation in CDKN1B. However, due to the small number of cases documented in literature, the peculiar clinical features of MEN4 are still largely unknown, and clear indications about the clinical management of these patients are currently lacking. In order to enlarge our knowledge on MEN4 and to better typify the clinical fe...

The rate of diagnosis of pituitary adenomas in the elderly is increasing, as a consequence of the improved life expectancy. The management of elderly patients affected by pituitary adenomas are still a subject of debate in literature. In particular, data on the safety of endoscopic transnasal transsphenoidal surgery (TNS) are still controversial. The primary endpoint of the present study is to assess the surgical outcome of a cohort of patients who underwent TNS for non-functi...

Treatment options for neuroendocrine tumors (NET), including everolimus, are rarely curative, as NETs frequently show resistance to medical therapy. In fact, the use of everolimus, an mTOR inhibitor, is limited by the development of resistance, probably due to the activation of Akt signalling. Metformin seems to have anticancer effects in neuroendocrine tumors (NETs). A recent retrospective study found longer progression-free-survival in diabetic pancreatic neuroendocrine tumo...

Chronic exposure to GH hypersecretion may alter the physiological balance of the spine through inducing degeneration of intervertebral discs and impaired trophism of facet joints. Moreover, GH in excess may also cause profound deterioration in bone microstructure with consequent increase in risk of fragility vertebral fractures (VFs). In this cross-sectional study,we evaluated for the first time in acromegaly the association between spine imbalance and VFs. Thirty-eight patien...

TNM 8th edition introduces changes in the staging of patients with differentiated thyroid carcinoma (DTC). This study aims at assessing the ability of TNM 8th edition in predicting structural recurrence of DTC.480 DTC patients were retrospectively evaluated by 7th and 8th editions of TNM staging systems in relationship with risk stratification, response to therapy and recurrence of disease as defined by 2015 American Thyroid Association (ATA) guidelines. As compared to the 7th...

Objective: To evaluate the association between testosterone (T) values and clinical outcome of COVID-19.Methods: This is a retrospective single-center study performed on 221 male patients (median age 70.5 years, range 26-93) with COVID-19 and hospitalized in our Institution between November 1st 2020 and January 31st 2021. Patients’ height, weight, BMI, medical history and comorbidities were recorded; at admission, patients underwent sampling for com...

Background: Patients affected by gastroenteropancreatic-neuroendocrine tumors (GEP-NETs) present an increased risk of bone fragility due to several factors, such as bone metastases, vitamin D deficiency, hormonal secretion, medical and surgical treatments. Although patients with well-differentiated GEP-NETs generally present a long life-expectancy, occurrence of fragility fractures could significantly impair quality of life.Objectives: The study aims to ...

Introduction: Cyclic Cushing’s syndrome (cCS) is a rare condition characterized by periods of excessive cortisol secretion (peaks), alternating with phases of eucortisolism (through). In most cases, cCS is caused by an ACTH-secreting pituitary tumor, while only few cases of cyclic ectopic ACTH secretion (cEAS) have been described.Case presentation: In February 2023, a 58-year-old woman was referred to our Endocrine Unit due to a 10-year history of r...

The bone strain index (BSI) is a marker of bone deformation based on a finite element analysis inferred from dual X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) scans, that has been proposed as a predictor of fractures in osteoporosis. BSI value represents the average equivalent strain in a skeletal site, assuming that a higher strain level (higher BSI) indicates a lower bone’s resistance to loads with consequent higher risk of fractures. BSI index is usually calculated for specific loading ...