Endocrine Abstracts

Synthetic glucocorticoids (GCs) including dexamethasone (Dex) are potent anti-inflammatory drugs. However, long-term use of GCs results in deleterious side effects such as hyperglycemia, hepatosteatosis, and insulin resistance. The nuclear hormone receptors LXRα and LXRβ are known for their important roles in modulating whole-body cholesterol homeostasis. Recently, we have shown that liver X receptor β (LXRβ) knockout mice are protected against Dex-induced ...

A 51-year-old Afro-Caribbean lady with a history of primary hyperparathyroidism, type 2 diabetes and hypertension was admitted with confusion. Her medication at the time included five anti-hypertensives.She was treated for an infection but despite a long course of antibiotics she remained confused with visual hallucinations and aggression.She was noted to have resistant hypertension with systolic blood pressures over 220 mmHg and p...

A 64-year-old female presented to the acute medical take with hypercalcaemia. She had a 3 weeks history of polyuria, polydipsia, constipation, intermittent abdominal pain and feeling depressed. She reported weight loss of 3.5 kg over the past 6 months. She denied symptoms of dysphagia, dyspnoea, haemoptysis, haematemesis, or malaena. Her past medical history included anaemia, ischaemic heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and uterine prolapse. She was an ex-smo...

Regulation of hepatic gluconeogenesis by insulin and glucagon is central to blood glucose homeostasis. It has been proposed that the members of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK)-related kinases, the salt inducible kinase (SIK) isoforms, may play a role as signalling mediator in the control of insulin- and glucagon-regulated hepatic gluconeogenesis. However, the exact regulation and contribution of SIKs in hepatic gluconeogenesis is largely elusive. Here we employed selective...

Introduction: Diabetes is a chronic condition which has become a major public health concern approaching epidemic proportions globally. Effective diabetes management often presents many challenges. Clinicians and patients often become overwhelmed by the need to address co-morbid chronic conditions in addition to patients’ diabetes-specific treatment goals. It is widely accepted that bariatric surgery can help improve health in a range of metabolic diseases, including T2D...

Due to the non-specificity of symptoms in male neonates affected by salt-wasting (SW) CAH, it is hypothesised that a proportion die prior to diagnosis in countries lacking a newborn screening (NBS) programme, such as the UK. The aim of this study was to analyse 17-hydroxyprogesterone (17-OHP) in stored NBS blood spot samples, to detect undiagnosed cases of CAH. Samples were retrieved from storage for neonates who were born between 1994 and 2006, who subsequently died before 7 ...

Background: Persistent Müllerian Duct syndrome (PMDS) is characterised by the presence of Müllerian structures in a 46XY male. PMDS can result from either a defect in Anti-Müllerian hormone (AMH) production or in the AMH receptor. AMH causes the Müllerian ducts to atrophy, enabling the testes to move transabdominally to the deep inguinal rings and into the scrotum. In the absence of AMH action, PMDS can cause problems with testicular descent. We present a f...

Background: Microalbuminuria is an early marker of diabetic nephropathy in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) which predicts the development of later stages of nephropathy. Thiazolidinediones are a class of oral hypoglycaemic drugs used in diabetes glycaemic management that act through PPARγ receptors. Studies have suggested they significantly reduce urinary albumin excretion; however, most trials were small. We therefore performed a systematic review to clarify the effectiv...

Sepsis continues to be a leading clinical problem, with ~1.8 million people worldwide affected. This continual increase in sepsis and related deaths is in part due to age, increased frequency of invasive procedures and widespread bacterial antibiotic resistance, with mortality often related to underlying disorders that often accompany sepsis. Sepsis affects the brain, and the impairment of brain function is often associated with severe infectious disease1. The endog...

CD38 is an enzyme which catalyses the production of the second messengers cyclic ADP ribose and nicotinic acid adenine dinucleotide phosphate which mobilize calcium from ryanodine-sensitive intracellular calcium stores. Intracellular calcium is well known to be important for mobilisation of secretory granules to the plasma membrane in preparation for exocytosis and CD38 signalling has recently been demonstrated to increase posterior pituitary oxytocin release (Jin et al.</i...