Endocrine Abstracts

Purpose: The purpose of our study is to compare the effectiveness of PLA and RFA procedures in the treatment of benign thyroid nodules discussing indications, techniques, complication and outcomes derived from our experience.Method and materials: Thirty-eight patients (26F; 55±14) with benign thyroid nodules were treated, 15 with PLA and 23 with RF. Nodules were classified as thy2 through two consecutive fine-needle-aspiration (FNA) and selected for...

Purpose: Our purpose was to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of a virtual needle tracking system for US-guided percutaneous RFA of benign thyroid nodules (BTN) as compared to standard RFA.Method and materials: A STARmed (Korea) 18G bipolar RF electrode was used to perform the BTN ablation procedures. A US machine (LOGIQ E9, GE Healthcare) with a low magnetic field generator was used; electromagnetic sensors, calculating their mutual position, were s...

Silibinin, a milk thistle extract with known hepatoprotective effects, has recently been shown to act upon tumoral corticotropes and revert the Cushingoid phenotype in an allograft mouse model (Riebold et al. 2015). Silbinin is known to inhibit HSP90 -a chaperone to the glucocorticoid receptor-thereby restoring sensitivity to glucocorticoid negative feedback in tumoral corticotropes. Aim of the present study was to assess the effect of silibinin on ACTH synthesis and ...

CHH is a rare disease with a relevant genetic background, and is characterized by a failure to enter (complete forms) or to complete (partial forms) pubertal development. It requires a treatment to allow the completion of puberty, and in male this goal can be achieved either using testosterone replacement therapy or administering gonadotropins (Gn); the latter allows both testicular development and the endogenous testosterone production. There are few studies evaluating the th...

Introduction: The impact of metabolic syndrome (MetS) on male infertility has been poorly studied. We recently reported that MetS is associated with hypogonadism, poor sperm morphology and testis ultrasound inhomogeneity. However, the possible associations between MetS and prostate-related symptoms and signs are still lacking.Methods: Out of 351 subjects without genetic abnormalities previously evaluated for couple infertility clinically and by scrotal u...

Objective: To verify whether, in a large sample of male subjects seeking medical care for sexual dysfunction (SD), prostate-specific antigen (PSA) might represent a reliable marker of testosterone bioactivity, even downstream to its receptor binding.Design: Cross-sectional study.Methods: A consecutive series of 3156 patients attending our Unit for SD studied. Among them, only subjects without history of prostate disease and with PS...

Introduction: The Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) algorithm is one of the most efficient instruments for the prediction of incident type 2 diabetes (T2DM). Recently it has been shown to predict another relevant cardiovascular (CV) risk factor, such as chronic kidney disease.The aim of the present study is to verify whether, in patients with erectile dysfunction (ED), the use of ARIC diabetes risk score might improve the efficacy in predicting ...

Introduction: Hypoactive sexual desire is defined as a persistent or recurrent deficient or absent sexual fantasies or desire for sexual activity which should not be comorbid with other medical conditions or with the use of psychoactive medications. Reduced libido is a symptom referring more to a reduction in sexual drive for sexual activity. The aim of the present study is to investigate the risk factors of primary reduced libido (i.e. not associated with conditions causing l...

Introduction: The classification of subjects as low or high cardiovascular (CV) risk is usually performed by risk engines, based upon multivariate prediction algorithms. However, their accuracy in predicting major adverse CV events (MACE) is lower in high-risk populations, since they take into account only conventional risk factors.Aim: To evaluate the accuracy of Progetto Cuore risk engine in predicting MACE in subjects with erectile dysfunction (ED), a...

Introduction: The relational domain of erectile dysfunction (ED) is difficult to investigate in a clinical setting. We developed and validated SIEDY, a 13-item structured interview, which assesses, beside the organic (Scale1) and intra-psychic (Scale 3) domains, also the relation one (Scale 2). We previously established a pathological threshold for SIEDY Scale 1 and 3.Aim: To identify a pathological threshold of SIEDY Scale 2.Metho...