Endocrine Abstracts

The diagnosis and differential diagnosis of hypercortisolism can be a major clinical challenge and involves several stages. In each stage different approaches are currently followed. There are, however, some general principles. In brief, after critical judgement of clinical features, the first step is to assess whether endogenous hypercortisolism is present. First-line tests to screen for hypercortisolism include measurement of 24 h urinary cortisol excretion, cortisol diurnal...

In vitro 3D cell culture systems seem to appropriately reproduce the tumor cell microenvironment, including nutrients-oxygen conditions and cell-cell interactions. These models may better mimic in vivo tumor conditions and more accurately reproduce drug treatments effects. Since most in vitro studies in neuroendocrine tumors (NETs) are performed in 2D culture systems (monolayer), we aimed to compare the monolayer system with a 3D spheroid cell cultur...

Introduction: A substantial proportion of pheochromocytomas (PCC) are detected during the work-up of an adrenal incidentaloma. Recently it has been suggested that in case of an adrenal incidentaloma with an unenhanced attenuation value <10 Hounsfield Units (HU) on CT imaging biochemical testing to rule out PCC is unnecessary. We aimed to determine the sensitivity of the 10 HU cut-off value to detect pheochromocytoma.Methods: Retrospective multicenter...

Background: Administration of α-adrenergic receptor antagonists is recommended before resection of a pheochromocytoma (PCC) in order to prevent perioperative cardiovascular complications. For this purpose either phenoxybenzamine (PXB) or doxazosin (DOX) is commonly prescribed. We conducted the first randomized controlled trial comparing the efficacy of PXB and DOX in controlling perioperative hemodynamics in patients undergoing PCC resection (ClinicalTrials.gov:NCT0137989...