Endocrine Abstracts

Pheocromocytomas (PHEO) are catecholamine secreting tumours which can occur sporadically or as part of other hereditary/familial syndromes including Neurofibromotosis 1 (NF-1). Unlike the case with other genetic syndromes, the current neurofibromatosis guidelines do not recommend a routine hormonal screening strategy for PHEO in the absence of hypertension or other symptoms. In this paper we describe 2 asymptomatic and normotensive patients with NF-1 where secretory PHEO were ...

Hyperparathyroidism jaw tumour syndrome (HPT-JT) is an autosomal dominant disease with variable penetrance. Onset is typically in late adolescence or early adulthood. Primary hyperparathyroidism is typically caused by a single parathyroid adenoma but parathyroid carcinoma occurs in 10–15%. Ossifying fibroma of the mandible or maxilla occurs in 30–40%, and may be locally aggressive. 15% of patients have renal manifestations which include polycystic kidney disease, Wil...

The standard management for Grave’s thyrotoxicosis includes the use anti-thyroid drugs, surgery and radioactive iodine treatment. In certain situations,alternative methods including bile acid sequestrants and therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE) have proven effective especially when other treatment modalities fail. We describe a case where conventional and alternative non-invasive measures failed to restore an euthyroid state and resorted to emergency thyroidectomy. A 49 yea...

Although initially considered rare, the incidence of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours (P-NETs) has progressively increased. A population-based study conducted in England and Wales (1986–1999) found that 5-year survival was 29% for non-functioning and 41% for functioning tumours when considering well-differentiated P-NETs. Traditional treatments show very limited effectiveness; novel targeted therapies are, therefore, required and identification of key molecules driving n...

Introduction: Hyponatraemia is the commonest inpatient electrolyte abnormality and its severity correlates with inpatient mortality, length of stay and use of hospital resources. Frequently, hyponatraemia is not sufficiently acknowledged in the acute medical setting. The aim of this audit was to evaluate the investigation and management of hyponatraemia in a district general hospital.Methods: Seventy-seven hyponatraemic patients (Na<...

Introduction: The assessment of a new patient in the medical outpatients relies on thorough history taking as well as clinical examination. In particular, biochemical tests are pivotal in the diagnosis of endocrine conditions. Historically, our unit only mostly performed biochemical tests after new patients attended clinic. We proposed that diagnosis and management would be more efficient if this system was reverted, with the aim of minimising the number of clinic appointments...

The oxytocin (OT) treatment protects heart against ischemia. Here we investigated heart-derived H9c2 cells in simulated ischemia-reperfusion (I-R) experiments in order to examine the mechanism of OT-induced cardioprotection.Results: I-R was induced in an anoxic chamber for 2 h and followed by 2 h of reperfusion. In comparison to normoxia, I-R resulted in decrease of formazan production by H9c2 cells to 63.5±1.7% (MTT assay) and enhanced apoptosis fr...

During maturation of oxytocin (OT) prohormone, several bioactive intermediate molecules are formed. The plasma concentrations of these forms (OT-G; OT-GK and OT-GKR) increase markedly in rat circulation at the end of gestation. At low concentration in the circulation OT stimulates while OT-GKR inhibits diuresis. Since OT and OT-GKR show different effects on the urine flow, we hypothesized that OT-GKR modulates renal action by targeting the V2 receptor.<p class="...

Introduction: Neonatal hypoglycaemia (NH) is a well-recognized cause of adverse neurological outcomes. While hypoglycaemic brain injury is well reported in the literature there is limited data on the effect of neonatal hypoglycaemia solely with other risk factors for brain injury excluded. The aim of study was to evaluate the long-term outcome in patients with a history of symptomatic NH and no other risk factors of brain injury.Methodology: This retrosp...

Background: In 2007, the Turner syndrome (TS) consensus study group developed an international guideline for clinical care of girls and women with TS. Given emerging concerns of long term cardiovascular complications, the consensus recommends that cardiac MRI should be performed when girls are old enough to tolerate the procedure or at the time of transition and to be repeated at least every 5–10 years.Method: We conducted a survey ...