Endocrine Abstracts

Background: It is estimated that 1-6% of patients with a pituitary adenoma develop ocular nerve palsies. These are primarily due to tumour extension into the cavernous sinus and most commonly affect the 3rd cranial nerve. Because of its sheltered position within the sinus, the 6th cranial nerve is rarely affected. When this does occur, it most commonly results from ischemic neuropathy secondary to diabetes, hypertension or mononeuritis multiplex.<p cl...

Successful embryo implantation requires changes in endometrial gene expression of biomarkers which contribute to uterine receptivity to facilitate blastocyst attachment. Osteopontin (OPN), expressed at the maternal–foetal interface may facilitate implantation in processes, such as cell adhesion, migration and angiogenesis which require OPN signalling via CD44 and integrin receptors. As coordinate expression of OPN and receptors is shown to be cycle-dependent and up-regula...

Objective: A review of the efficacy and safety of radioiodine treatment for Graves’ disease.Methodology: Patients were identified following a search of the nuclear medicine departmental database. Consecutive patients who had radioiodine in 3-year period from January 2009 to December 2011 were included in the audit. Information was obtained from medical notes, blood results and nuclear medicine database. Data was analysed using Microsoft Excel.<p...

Background: An 81-year-old gentleman presented to his GP with a 2 week history of reduced appetite, lethargy and 2–3 kg weight loss over the last month. On routine bloods, his potassium was noted to be 2.2 mmol/l. He was being treated in the community with indapamide, losartan and amlodipine for hypertension. He was admitted to hospital for IV replacement. However, he had persistent hypokalaemia (<2.9 mmol/l) for 3 days despite appropriate replacement and suspension ...

Background: Spondyloarthritis is a chronic inflammatory rheumatic disease which may be associated with different comorbidities such as glucose intolerance.Objectives: Determine the frequency of impaired fasting glucose in a population of patients with spondyloarthritis.Methods: We performed a cross-sectional study including 50 patients with spondyloarthritis (SA) diagnosed according to ASAS criteria. Fasting glucose was measured fo...

Introduction: Pseudoxanthoma elasticum (PXE), a multisystem heritable disorder, is characterized by ectopic mineralization of soft connective tissues. It is an autosomal recessive disorder in which mutations in the ABCC6 gene result in low levels of inorganic pyrophosphate (PPi).In its classic form, PXE is a late-onset, slowly progressing disease, and the major clinical problems relate to development of vascular complications, including hypertension, int...

Introduction: Peutz-Jeghers syndrome (PJS) is a rare familial disorder with an incidence of one in 12–30,000 live births characterized by mucocutaneous pigmentation, gastrointestinal and extra gastrointestinal hamartomatous polyps and an increased risk of malignancy.Case presentation: We report a 22-year-old female hypothyroid since age of 4, type 1 diabetic since age of 11, who presented with melaena. Pigmentation of the buccal mucosa, multiple lip...

At implantation, the ability of an embryo to successfully attach to the luminal epithelium is dependent on the receptive phenotype the endometrium must acquire. This spatially and temporally restricted period of uterine receptivity is defined by endometrial molecular adaptations, highly regulated by embryonic-derived signals and ovarian steroids. Critical to this isthe expression of adhesivemoleculesintegrins and osteopontin (OPN) at the foetal-maternal interface which facilit...

Introduction: We previously reported the novel finding that leptin, and several other fat-derived hormones (adipokines), is expressed and regulated in rat hypothalamus (1). Subsequently leptin (ob) mRNA was found in human, sheep and pig brain, but was surprisingly undetectable in mouse brain. In the present experiments we used a mouse hypothalamic neuronal cell line to investigate possible inhibitory mechanisms that may prevent mouse neurons from expressing ob mRNA. These incl...

Medicago sativa plants are commonly used as green fodder. In this study, estrogen-like activity of ethanolic extract of Medicago sativa plants and its possible effects on serum biochemical metabolites in immature female rats were investigated. Crude extract of dried Medicago sativa plants was prepared in 90% ethanol using Soxhlet’s apparatus. Fifteen immature female rats were divided into 3 equal groups. Rats of groups A and B were given the extract at the dose of 250 (lo...