Endocrine Abstracts

The prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in at-risk groups is rising even in sunny countries. Aim of this study was to compare vitamin D status and effect of vitamin D supplementation of moderate risk (mildly pigmented, WHO skin type 2) breastfed newborns from sunny and temperate climate zones. Newborns in Perth (30°S, group 1:5 male, 6 female) did not receive any vitamin D supplementation, newborns in Berlin (52.5°N, 17 male, 23 female) were randomised into n=2...

Somatostatin (somatotrophin release inhibiting factor; SRIF) is produced primarily in the hypothalamus and pancreas and inhibits the secretion of many hormones and neurotransmitters. Moreover, SRIF and SRIF analogs are able to inhibit tumor growth. Many human neuroendocrine and non-neuroendocrine tumors express the five known somatostatin receptors (sst1–5) in different amounts.Tachyphylaxis after prolonged treatment with octreotide (Sand...

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Hyperinsulinemia leading to insulin resistance is the major factor in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes mellitus. And also defect in glucose uptake is among the primary defects associated with peripheral insulin resistance. Interestingly, the result from our previous study indicated that the ethanolic extract of Combretum decandrum Roxb. (CD) had a hypoglycemic effect in type 1 diabetic rat model. Therefore this study examined the effect of CD extract on the glucose t...

The adrenal steroid dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) has been shown in vivo, to mimic the effects of peroxosome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR) ligands and oppose those of glucocorticoids, thus producing beneficial effects on insulin sensitivity and adipogenesis in obese and diabetic rodents. Furthermore, DHEA treatment has recently been shown to reduce subcutaneous and visceral fat in humans in vivo. However, the mechanism by which DHEA produces these anti-a...

Endocrinopathies are amongst the most common complications of thallasaemia, which is a hereditary disorder of haemoglobin synthesis and excessive iron deposition is thought to be the main reason.Our hospital serves a multiethnic population and consequently we see a substantial number of patients with thallasaemia who are screened for endocrine complications. Those found to have endocrine problems are reviewed in our joint thallasaemia-endocrine clinic. B...

Headaches associated with acromegaly are common even after hypophysectomy. Medical treatment with dopamine agonists and Somatostatin analogues often help. We report two cases when pharmacological therapy failed but further surgical removal of residual pituitary tissue cured the headaches.A 38 year-old lady presented with an eight year history of headaches, unresponsive to simple analgesia. Acromegaly was confirmed by a raised serum growth hormone (GH) 33...

Aim: To assess hormonal function of cortex of adrenal glands in patients (pts) after cardiac arrest (CA) and its role for survival.Material: CA-pts- 52 pts after CA in the age 62±13 years. 26 pts died after CA (CA-D-pts), 26 pts survived and were discharged from hospital (CA-S-pts). H-pts- 22 pts in the age 60±11 years with stable coronary artery disease.Methods: In CA-pts concentrations(conc) of adrenocorticotropin (ACTH...

Without adequate treatment patients with acromegaly die prematurely from cardiovascular disease (CVD); however the contribution of atherosclerosis in this process is controversial. Increased carotid IMT is an early morphological marker of atherosclerosis and predictor of subsequent cardiovascular events. Contradictory data exist regarding IMT in patients with acromegaly.We measured carotid IMT in 79 patients with acromegaly (47 male, mean age 55±14 ...

Background: Clinical manifestations of hyperthyroidism resemble those of hyperadrenergic state. Previous studies of linear analysis of heart rate variability (HRV) revealed cardiac autonomic dysfunctions in hyperthyroidism. In recent years, increasing attention is being directed to the nonlinear analysis of HRV to gain insight into neural modulation of heart rate dynamics. Based on the chaos and fractal theory, an attractor in phase space can characterize the dynamics of a cha...