Endocrine Abstracts

A 36 year old lady referred to the endocrinology clinic, with a history of tiredness, fatigability and abnormal thyroid function. She had no significant past medial history, no family history of thyroid disease and her only medication was an oral contraceptive pill (Ovranette). She had experienced fatigue over a period of 5 years, since returning from a visit to Pakistan, during which she had developed diarrhoea which had persisted for about 12 months. Thyroid function tests a...

Case history: A 50-year-old lady, on Lithium for 30 years, presented with a history of progressively increasing thirst since 12 months; associated with polyuria and nocturia. She had been having some joint aches and was finding it more difficult to get up and down stairs. She was found to be hypothyroid few months back and prior to that had been falling asleep easily. There had been an improvement in her energy levels after starting Levothyroxine. She gave no history of renal ...

Case History: A 74-year-lady with a background of COPD presented to the emergency department with precordial chest pain radiating to the left arm. The pain had been ongoing since a few hours, and was associated with diaphoresis. She was hemodynamically stable, with no tachycardia Investigations: ECG showed significant ST-segment elevations, predominantly in the chest leads, with elevated troponins. Assuming it to be STEMI, she was transferred to the tert...

Background: Although the excision of ACTH-producing tumors is the principal treatment for Cushing’s disease (CD), pharmacologic treatment has a well-established role. As corticotroph adenomas express somatostatin (SST) receptors (SSTRs), pasireotide – a pluripotent somatostatin analogue, acting on four of five SSTRs has a potential role in treatment of CD among various medical agents.Case report: We report a 39-year-old female with recurrence o...

Introduction: Parathyroid hormone (PTH) secretion is regulated by the concentration of extracellular ionized calcium. The calcium sensing receptors (CaSR) of parathyroid chief cells play a central role in calcium homeostasis. Their activity is reduced by calcimimetics, the compounds that directly increase the sensitivity of CaSR to extracellular ionized calcium. Cinacalcet hydrochloride, an oral calcimimetic, is indicated in treatment of primary hyperparathyroidism (PHP), for ...

Background: The MHC is the most important susceptibility locus for human autoimmune diseases (AID). Although associations between MHC class II DRB1 alleles and Addison disease (AD) have been repeteadly proven in various populations, the biological mechanisms underlying this association remains unknown. Peptide presentation to T cells may be important in the initiation or progression of AID. Disease-linked polymorphisms map to the peptide-binding sites of MHC molecules class II...

Currently, acromegaly is treatable by 3 groups of drugs available for the treatment of acromegaly: dopamine agonists (DA), somatostatin analogues (SRL) and a growth hormone receptor blocker (GH receptor antagonist GHRA). More recently, pasireotide and pasireotide-LAR were developed as multi-receptor targeted SRLs with higher potency than 1st generation SRLs/octreotide-LAR and lanreotide/and until now were considered second generation SRLs. Pasireotide, unlike first-generation ...

Objectives: Hyperthyroidism is associated with a high basal metabolic rate and weight loss is a common symptom. However, it has been observed, that once patients are treated, they gain back the lost weight and may also put on more. Given that weight gain is a health factor, there’s interest in studying the effect that the thyroid levels have on weight gain and potential harmful health consequences.Methods: 79 patients (58 female) with hyperthyroidis...

Parathyroid carcinoma (PTCa) is an uncommon cause of primary hyperparathyroidism (PHP), statistically representing <1–2% of all cases of PHP. Early resection of the primary tumor is the only curative treatment, however this is frequently incomplete. As a consequence, recurrence of PTCa presenting as locally invasive tumor and/or metastatic process is not rare. Morbidity and mortality are generally caused by the effects of unremitting hypercalcemia rather than tumor gr...

Case history: A 50 year old female presented with diarrhoea, facial rash and hyponatraemia. In addition, she described a 3 week history of headaches, malaise, intermittent joint pain and swelling. On examination, the patient was noted to have a malar rash and over the subsequent 2–3 days began to develop necrotic patches on both ears. She had no evidence of cutaneous pigmentation. She took no regular medication, other than dabigatran. Past medical history of note included...