Endocrine Abstracts

We present the case of a 70 year-old man who presented with several months history of tiredness and lethargy. He had a past medical history of ischaemic heart disease. Examination identified a bitemporal hemianopia. Initial investigations demonstrated hyponatraemia, sodium 117 mmol/L (Reference range 132–145) with normokalaemia. Further investigations confirmed hypopituitarism: Short Synacthen Test Cortisol at T=0 min, 125 mmol/L, Cortisol at T=30 mins, 277 mmol/L, free T...

The current paradigm for management of acromegaly includes surgery as primary treatment regardless of whether or not this is likely to be curative. There is increasing evidence that somatostatin analogue medical therapy may produce shrinkage of growth hormone producing pituitary tumours. This study tests the hypothesis that primary medical therapy may produce clinically significant tumour shrinkage prior to surgery.Eleven treatment naïve subjects wi...

61 patients (104 invited participants), within 10 years of active treatment for acromegaly, from five hospitals in the UK (one neurosurgical centre) were interviewed to explore the experience of living with acromegaly, access to information, support and their ability to make decisions about their care. Semi-structured interviews by an independent consultant (60–120 min each) included 34 males, 27 females; 25–85 years old; 85% patients had surgery. 56 (92%) experience...