Endocrine Abstracts

A seasonal occurrence of Graves’ disease (GD) has been reported in previous studies, with a peak of frequency in the warmer half of the year (Ford 1988, 1991, Westphal 1994) or the period of the year with a higher iodine intake (Phillips 1985); other studies (Facciani 2000) have failed to find a different seasonal occurrence of Graves’ orbitopathy (GO). Aim of the present study was to evaluate a possible seasonal difference in the onset of GD and GO in a series of ou...

Objectives: Recommending general dynamic penile color doppler ultrasound (D-PCDU) screening in patients with erectile dysfunction (ED) has been questioned due to an inadequate cost-benefit ratio. The aim of the present study is to asses the validity of different risk scores in the identification of patients being screened for arteriogenic ED at D-PCDU.Design and methods: A consecutive series of 738 (mean age 53.6±9.2 years) patients with ED was stud...

Objectives: The aim of present study is to determine psychobiological characteristics of sexual dysfunction (SD) associated with metabolic syndrome (MS; as defined by National Cholesterol Education Program’s Adult Treatment Panel III, NCEP-ATP-III criteria) in a consecutive series of 803 male out-patients.Methods: Several hormonal, biochemical and instrumental (penile doppler ultrasound, PDU) parameters were studied, along with psycho...

The sodium/iodide transporter (NIS) mediates active I− uptake in thyroid, lactating breast, salivary gland, and stomach epithelial cells. NIS-mediated I− transport is electrogenic with a 2:1 Na+:I− stoichiometry, i.e. when NIS activity is measured electrophysiologically in NIS-expressing oocytes, inward positive currents are recorded upon addition of I− or other anions that are NIS substrates. Howev...

Objectives: Radical prostatectomy is an effective therapy for men with clinically localized prostate cancer. A significant number of men develop erectile dysfunction after radical prostatectomy (PPED) due to intraoperatory cavernous nerve injury causing hypoxia and fibrosis of corpus cavernosus. We established an experimental model of bilateral cavernous neurotomy (BCN) in the rat in order to investigate whether sildenafil treatment in PPED patients could prevent penile tissue...

Objectives: To study the association of functional polymorphisms at DHFR, CBS and MTHFR genes with bone mineral density (BMD) and metabolic parameters of bone remodeling.Materials and methods: BMD (g/cm2) was measured by DEXA in 391 subjects: 174 with normal BMD (137F 37M; age=48.79±12.99 years; BMI=29.61±5.22 kg/m2), 62 with osteopenia (48F 14M; age=56.06±12.96 years; BMI=27.64±4.94 kg/m2) and 154 with osteoporosis (119F, 35M; age=64...

Background: Graves’ disease (GD) female patients in remission after a full course of methimazole (MMI) therapy are at risk for a relapse of hyperthyroidism during the post-partum (PP) period, but whether this relapse may display any peculiarity is still unknown.Aim: To compare GD patients undergoing a relapse of hyperthyroidism either in the PP period or not.Subjects and methods: Fourty-three female patients of childbearing ag...

Introduction: Pseudohyperkalaemia is one of the most common testing errors that occur in clinical practice. It’s commonly due to pre-analytical factors many of which are clinically well recognised. These include incorrect sampling, delay in sample processing and haemolysis to name a few. However non-recognition of some rarer causes like thrombocytosis often results in initial inappropriate, potentially dangerous treatment. Here we present one such case of pseudohyperkalaemia i...

Objectives: During the Covid-19 pandemic caused by the severe-acute-respiratory-syndrome-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), vaccination has been widely adopted. Both SARS-CoV-2 infection and Covid-19 vaccines have been associated with several thyroid disorders. We studied the risk of Thyroid Eye Disease (TED) following Covid-19 vaccination.Methods: This self-controlled-case-series study, validated model in assessing vaccine safety, included 98 consecutive patie...

Background: The 5-year survival rate for patients with advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (pNETs) is less than 30%. Notch signaling is a transmembrane receptor pathway with four distinct isoforms, activation of which is linked to cellular differentiation, cell fate, and viability. Both Notch1 and Notch3 signaling have been shown to be dysregulated in pNETs. Notch3 activation has been shown to repress Notch1 activity in other cancers. We hypothesize that activation of No...