Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Germline mutations of the AIP tumour suppressor gene are associated with familial and sporadic pituitary adenomas, yet the tumorigenic mechanisms remain unclear. In addition, AIP protein expression in somatotroph adenomas from patients without AIP mutations correlates with clinical behaviour and somatostatin analogues responsiveness. Understanding the regulation of AIP gene expression will help uncover its pituitary tumour-suppressor role.Aim...

Background: PA is a clinical syndrome secondary to hemorrhage or infarction of pituitary tumour, presenting with sudden onset headache and oculomotor palsy. PA may be managed conservatively in patients without visual disturbances.Aim: To describe PA patients illustrating typical aspects and peculiarities.Results: Case 1, a 49 years old (yo) male, presented for loss of consciousness in the ER. MRI showed a giant pituitary tumour, wh...

Introduction: Hyponatremia, defined as a serum sodium concentration below 135 mEq/l, has a heterogeneous etiology, the main endocrine causes includind the syndrome of inappropiate antidiuresis (SIAD), adrenal insufficiency and severe hypothyroidism.Materials and methods: Clinical, hormonal and imaging evaluationAim: To present a case of hyponatremia leading to the diagnosis of a large pituitary tumorCase pres...

Introduction: Intrasellar arachnoid cysts are rare and clinically resemble nonfunctional pituitary adenomas. Arachnoid cysts should be considered in the differential diagnosis of cysts developing in the sellar region, together with cystic pituitary adenoma, craniopharyngioma, epidermoid cysts, and Rathke’s cleft cysts. Symptomatic cysts are operated but can recurr.Case presentation: We present 2 cases of compressive intrasellar arachnoid cysts occur...

Introduction: Pituitary incidentaloma (PitInc), defined as an unsuspected mass observed on imaging studies performed for unrelated conditions. Most such lesions are not clinically significant at initial evaluation and current guidelines recommend periodic follow-up.Aim: To present a rare case of delayed onset of acromegaly in a patient with a nonfunctioning PitInc, raising the question of the utility of prolonged follow-up of PitInc.<p class="abstext...

Introduction: Both TSH and prolactin serum levels within normal range were previously reported to be associated with metabolic parameters.Aim: To analyse the connections between serum levels of prolactin, TSH, and insulin resistance in polycystic ovary syndrome patients.Material and methods: 322 PCOS patients (mean age 24.3±5.16 years and mean BMI 28±7.57 kg/m2) with normal serum prolactin and without thyroid d...

Background: Pituitary adenomas (PA) are slow-growing, benign intracranial tumors. Rarely, they can be histologically and clinically aggressive.Aim: To present a case of corticotroph PA with aggressive behavior following a long indolent interval after the initial surgery.Case presentation: A 47 years old female presented in Nov 2007 with right temporal hemianopsia and left eye blindness, associating type 2 DM and severe mixed dyslip...

The multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2A (MEN 2A) is the consequence of a heritable mutation in the RET proto-oncogene, leading to a very high predisposition to develop medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC), pheochromocytoma and primary parathyroid hyperplasia. Screening of ‘at-risk’ family members and prophylactic thyroidectomy is recommended – but not always easily accomplished.Our proband was diagnosed with MTC in 1977 (at age 21),...

Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2A (MEN2A) is an inherited syndrome caused by the mutation of RET gene. The classic variant of this syndrome includes the presence of medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC), in association with pheochromocytoma and parathyroid neoplasia. MTC is usually the first presentation, with palpable neck mass and hypercalcitonemia, metastatic spread to local lymph nodes or distant sites.We report the case of a 41 year old Caucasian man...

A large body of evidence suggests that in polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) there is a link between abdominal adiposity, visceral adiposity dysfunction and hyperandrogenism and this relationship could be bidirectional. However a well designed study of adipose tissue distribution reported no significant differences between PCOS and controls. Visceral adiposity index (VAI) is a recently reported marker of the cardiovascular risk, strongly correlated with visceral adipose tissue (...