Endocrine Abstracts

Aim: To compare the use of glitazones against NICE guidelines. (Glitazone recommended as second line therapy in combination with metformin or sulfonyl urea in patients with intolerance or contra-indications to any of the two, not as monotherpay or triple therapy or in combination with insulin).Methods: Patients on glitazone therapy (n=60) were randomly identified from a pharmacy data base from August to December 2006. Retrospective case note revie...

The action of the regulatory neuropeptides vasoactive intestinal polypeptide (VIP) and pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide (PACAP) carries out through the shared receptors VPAC1 and VPAC2 and the exclusive PACAP receptor PAC1, all of which are G protein-coupled receptors. Formerly, we showed that the administration of both peptides enhance catecholamine, corticosterone and aldosterone release from adrenal cell co-culture. Further...

Congenital morphological alteration of anterior and/or posterior pituitary lobes is a rare disease often associated with isolated or multiple hormonal deficiency. In this study we re-evaluated 24 adult patients, 20 males and 4 females, (23–46 years), in whom Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) showed congenital morphological alteration of the gland. Twenty out of 24 patients presented with an association of hypoplasic adenohypophysis and ectopic neurohypophysis, while 4 pres...

Objectives: To assess the aetiology and management of hyperkalemia amongst inpatients in a district general hospital.Methods: Individuals with hyperkalemia (defined as potassium>6.5 mmol/L) were identified from a biochemistry lab database. Review of case records in a six month period to assess the aetiology and management. Patients on renal replacement therapy and those<18 years were excluded.Results: 45 patients were ident...

Background: The most common cause of death in patients with Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia type 2 is medullary thyroid carcinoma. All patients with MEN2 develop this cancer and Prophylactic Thyroidectomy (PT) is recommended to prevent malignant transformation.Method: This study reviews our experience of treating children identified as carriers of a RET mutation diagnostic of MEN-2A. Data was collected by reviewing patient notes and hospital electronic data...

The pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide (PACAP), isolated for the first time from hypothalamic extracts (Miyata et al. 1989), was localized in some peripheral tissues such as adrenal, gastrointestinal tract, ovary and testis (Arimura et al. 1991, Watanabe et al. 1992, Gathei et al. 1993, Shioda et al. 1994, Kononen et al. 1994). It was previously demonstrated that in the testis PACAP was involved in the steroidogenesis r...

FAP is a dominant autosomic syndrome, due to mutation of the APC oncosuppressor gene, characterised by adenomatous polyps at the colon–rectal level, that progres to malignant degeneration. FAP extraintestinal manifestations include, although rare, the thyroid nodules and tumours. Neck ultrasound (US) is routinely useful to identify thyroid nodules, but the characterisation of their nature requires the cytology by a FNAb. The exact incidence of the thyroid tumours on FAP s...

Several studies have identified a relationship between oncogene activation and dedifferentiation of PTC. Mutations of RAS, RET/PTC and BRAF modulate the expression of thyroid genes. An impaired NIS expression has been demonstrated in PTCs harboring the BRAFV600E mutation.Aim of this study was to analyze BRAF and RET/PTC1-3 alterations and their influence on the expression of thyroid differentiation genes. Seventy-one PTC samples were studied. Quantitative analysis o...

18FDG-PET is based on the capability of tumor cells to take up glucose. An increment in expression of the glucose transporter 1 (GLUT1) has been observed in thyroid tumors with poor prognosis but very few data are available about the expression of other glucose transporters in thyroid. Here, we study the expression and function of GLUT isoforms 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 in human thyroid carcinoma cell lines ARO and FRO (anaplastic carcinoma), NPA (poorly-differentiated papillar...

Aim: IFNα is a key regulator of the initial dialogue between pancreatic β-cells and the immune system in type 1 diabetes (T1D). IFNα induces endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress, insulitis and a massive HLA-ABC overexpression in human β-cells, three histological hallmarks of T1D. Against this background we investigated the global role of IFNα on iPSC-derived islet-like cells, used here to mimic islet cells in the early neonatal period when autoimmunity ag...