Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Excess adrenocorticotrophin (ACTH), most often from a pituitary tumour, results in the overproduction of cortisol and the condition, Cushing’s syndrome. Plasma ACTH measurements are used in the diagnosis of Cushing’s syndrome but due to the presence of multiple dibasic cleavage sites within its sequence, ACTH is extremely labile and far from an ideal analyte. Processing of ACTH by some ectopic tumours releases high levels of smaller-ACTH like fragments, &...