Endocrine Abstracts

In patients presenting with a diffusely enlarged hard thyroid gland the differential diagnosis lies between thyroid carcinoma, lymphoma, and Riedel’s thyroiditis. We present a case of Riedel’s thyroiditis with multifocal nodular sclerosis, which improved with levothyroxine replacement.A 40-year-old woman presented with a 3 months history of neck swelling, dysphagia and breathlessness on exertion. Examination revealed a hard, fixed, diffuse goit...

Severe growth hormone (GH) deficiency in adults is associated with adverse changes in quality of life (QoL), body composition and cardiovascular risk profile. NICE guidance restricts GH replacement in the UK to those with impaired QoL, defined by a score of >11 in the QoL-AGHDA questionnaire.Aims: To assess whether the NICE guidance differentiates other clinical or biochemical features in GH deficient adults.Patients and...

The use of the simplified IM glucagon stimulation test (IMGST) over its standard counterpart in the diagnosis of GH and cortisol deficiency has been advocated. Despite apparent comparable diagnostic utility, the simplified IMGST is capable of producing false positive results, raising the potential for misdiagnosis if relied upon exclusively.The aim of this study was to re-evaluate the diagnostic utility of the two forms of the IMGST, ascertaining the mag...

Females release 2–3 fold greater GH compared with males whilst maintaining similar IGF-I levels. IGF-I generation tests in healthy subjects suggest this discordancy results from resistance to GH in females. In GHD females the presumed relative insensitivity to GH is reflected by a lower basal IGF-I and higher GH maintenance doses during replacement. GHD adults of childhood- (CO) and adult-onset (AO) show CO-GHD adults to have lower basal IGF-I values and require higher ma...

Introduction: Omnitrope® (Sandoz) is a recombinant human growth hormone (rhGH) and was the first biosimilar medicine approved by the European Medicines Agency. PATRO Adults is an international, longitudinal, non-interventional study of the long-term safety and efficacy of Omnitrope® in adults treated in routine clinical practice. The study provides data on the long-term safety of rhGH in adult patients with severe GH deficiency (GHD). Here we pr...

Objective: Determinants of why only a subset of patients with adrenal insufficiency (AI) experience recurrent adrenal crises (AC) and intercurrent illnesses are not well understood. This study aimed to identify whether residual adrenal function (RAF), defined by the peak response to a provocative test undertaken before commencing glucocorticoids, may help explain differences in prevalence.Design and Methods: Patients wit...

Introduction: Emerging research in 3D-bone shape has provided new insights into the pathogenesis of osteoarthritis (OA). OA patients have increased subchondral bone area, associated with higher prevalence of cartilage loss. Higher B-score, a novel, machine learning-derived OA bone biomarker, is associated with increased OA symptom severity and structural progression. Arthropathy, despite being the commonest cause of morbidity amongst acromegaly patients, remains one of the und...

Introduction: Patients with acromegaly have increased mortality, primarily related to cardiovascular/cerebrovascular disease. The objective of this study was to evaluate whether GH/IGF-1 excess increases vascular disease by adversely affecting fibrin network characteristics.Methods: In this case–control study, 40 patients with acromegaly (21 males, age 53±13 years, 45% disease remission) and 40 age and gender-matched controls were recruited. Cl...

Introduction: Radiation-induced hypopituitarism has been well-described in childhood-onset brain tumour survivors, however in adults has received less attention. The aim of this study was to assess the pituitary-related outcomes following cXRT in adults with extra-sellar gliomas.Methods: We retrospectively collected longitudinal data regarding pituitary-related outcomes from medical records of 59 patients, diagnosed with extra-sellar gliomas in adulthood...

Introduction: Childhood-onset brain tumour (CO-BT) survivors demonstrate elevated standardized mortality rates for cardiac disease. Adverse lipid profile and body composition contribute to the increased cardiovascular risk. Little is known about the metabolic changes in long-term survivors of adult-onset brain tumours (AO-BT).Methods: We performed a cross-sectional study to compare cardiovascular risk parameters in CO-BT with AO-BT survivors and healthy ...