Endocrine Abstracts

Heart failure (HF) has been associated with bone loss and an increased risk of fragility fractures. Indeed, most of literature data on fractures were based on an historical and clinical approach focused on the identification of peripheral fractures, whereas the risk of vertebral fractures in this clinical setting is still unclear. In this study, we aimed at evaluating the prevalence of radiological vertebral fractures in 791 consecutive elderly and hospitalized patients (372 f...

AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) activation decreased GH release and intracellular GH storage in rat pituitary cell cultures and reduced cell proliferation in rat pituitary adenomatous cells (GH3) cultures.We investigated the effects of the AMPK activator 5-aminoimidazole-4-carboxamide ribonucleoside (AICAR) as compared to somatostatin-14 on cell viability (MTT assay after 48-h) and GH secretion (over 24 h) in 16 human GH-secreting pituitary adenomas ...

The long-acting somatostatin analogue octreotide is used either as an adjuvant or primary therapy to lower GH levels in patients with acromegaly and may also induce pituitary tumor shrinkage. However, inconclusive evidences in this respect have been produced by either single-center research paper or pooled analyses. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis to thoroughly assess the current literature on the effect of octreotide on pituitary tumor shrinkage. A computerized Medlin...

GH excess is considered as one of the causes of secondary osteoporosis with an increased risk of vertebral fractures in men and post-menopausal women with acromegaly. GH excess in acromegaly is also frequently associated with type 2 diabetes which is considered as a risk factor for fragility fractures in the general population. In this cross-sectional study, we evaluated whether type 2 diabetes may influence the prevalence vertebral fractures in acromegaly. Fifty-seven males w...

Hyperprolactinemia may cause bone loss in pre-menopausal women and men. Data on fractures are scanty and it is still unclear which is the skeletal impact of hyperprolactinemia in post-menopausal women. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of vertebral fractures in post-menopausal women with hyperprolactinemia.Forty post-menopausal women (median age 57 years, range: 47–81) with prolactin (PRL)-secreting adenoma and 119 control post-me...

Objective: Somatostatin analogues (SSA) are widely used for the treatment of patients with neuroendocrine tumors. These drugs are able to influence glucose metabolism by an inhibitory effect of insulin secretion, but the clinical impact of this effect is uncertain. Most of the data on this topic have been obtained from studies including patients in acromegaly, one the major indication for SSA, which are limited in terms of numerosity and study duration. Therefore, we have carr...

Context: Acromegaly can be complicated by cardiomyopathy. Treatment with somatostatin analogs has been shown to improve some cardiac parameters, but most published clinical trials involved few patients and were not randomized or controlled. In addition, their results are rather variable.Objective: To conduct a meta-analysis aimed at obtaining a more accurate picture of the effect of somatostatin analogs on the heart in patients with acromegaly.<p cla...

Introduction: Osteoporosis and vertebral fractures (VFs) commonly occur in overt and subclinical primary hyperthyroidism. In this clinical setting, bone damage is caused by the direct effects of thyroid hormone in excess on bone remodeling, although there is also evidence that low thyrotropin (TSH) values may play a role in driving fracture risk. In fact, TSH was shown to have direct inhibitory effects on osteoclastogenesis and bone resorption. Based on these data, one could a...

Background: Pituitary apoplexy (PA) is a rare endocrine and neurosurgical syndrome characterized by pituitary hemorrhage/infarction. SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination have been described as possible risk factors for PA, but the real impact of COVID-19 burden on PA epidemiology is still unknown.Purpose: To investigate the incidence of PA in the pandemic period during exposure to SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination and possible peculiar clinical charac...

Morphometric-Vertebral Fractures (VFs), which were widely demonstrated to reduce overall-survival and respiratory function in the general population, have been recently reported to be highly prevalent in COVID-19 patients. Emerging data show negative respiratory sequelae at long-term follow-up in COVID-19 survivors. The aim of this study is to evaluate the VFs influence on respiratory function of COVID-19 survivors. We included COVID-19 patients admitted at San Raffaele-Hospit...