Endocrine Abstracts

Metabolic syndrome (MetS) clusters cardiovascular and metabolic risk factors, along with hypogonadism (HG) and erectile dysfunction (ED). Lifestyle modifications, including physical exercise (PhyEx), are well-known treatments for this condition. We previously established a non-genomic, high-fat diet (HFD)-induced rabbit model of MetS that recapitulates the human phenotype, including HG and ED. We now report studies on the effect of PhyEx on hypothalamus-pituitary-testis (HPT) ...

Inflammation is hypothesized to play an important role in several diseases associated to the female genital tract and dihydrotestosterone (DHT) has shown immunomodulatory protective effects in experimental models of chronic inflammation. In the present study we aimed to evaluate the potential anti-inflammatory effects of DHT in a model of smooth muscle cells (hSMCs) isolated from human vagina biopsies and their potential role as APCs (Antigen Presenting Cells), crucial for the...

Background: Possible Autonomous Cortisol Secretion (pACS) is a condition found in 1–29% of patients with adrenal incidentalomas. The diagnosis of pACS has been variably associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events and mortality. However, dedicated studies describing the morphologic and functional cardiac alterations in these patients are lacking.Aim: To compare the cardiovascular features of patients with pACS to those with nonfunction...

The cAMP signaling pathway plays a major role in the pathogenesis of cortisol-producing adrenocortical adenomas (CPA). In adrenocortical cells cAMP induces dramatic changes in cell morphology accompanied by actin cytoskeleton rearrangements that precede steroidogenesis, the causal relationship between these events being still undefined. In this study we investigated cAMP effects on cytoskeleton rearrangements and steroidogenic response in mouse (Y1) and human adrenocortical tu...

Objective: The diagnosis of central hypoadrenalism (HPAI) is a major clinical challenge. The gold standard procedure remains insuline tolerance test (ITT). Liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) is considered the best procedure for the evaluation of cortisol levels. This study aimed to evaluate cut-offs of serum (TM-SeC) and salivary cortisol (SaC) by LC-MS/MS and serum cortisol by ECLIA assay (E-SeC) after Standard dose ACTH test (SDCT) in diagnosing HPAI.<...

Expanding brown adipose tissue is a potential therapeutic strategy to counteract insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome (MetS). Farnesoid X receptor (FXR) and Takeda G protein-coupled receptor 5 (TGR5) activation enhances insulin sensitivity, suggesting the capacity of FXR/TGR5 agonists to promote brown differentiation in adipose tissue. Treatment with increasing doses of the dual FXR/TGR5 agonist INT-767 (3, 10, 30 mg/Kg bw, daily for 5 days a week, by oral gavage, for 12 ...

Farnesoid X receptor (FXR) and Takeda G protein-coupled receptor 5 (TGR5) are interesting pharmacological targets for the treatment of liver and metabolic diseases. FXR-deficient mice on a high-fat diet (HFD) exhibit massive hepatic steatosis, necro-inflammation and fibrogenesis. Moreover, pharmacological activation of TGR5 in mice promotes protective mechanisms in biliary epithelial cells and inhibits hepatic and systemic inflammation. Thus, we hypothesized that a FXR/TGR5 du...

Introduction: Some variants of the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) gene have been found to alter glucocorticoid sensitivity and have been associated with worsen metabolic profiles.Objective: The aims of the present study were: i) to examine whether the prevalence of N363S, ER22/23EK and BclI variants was different in patients with adrenal incidentaloma (AI) and/or subclinical Cushing’s syndrome (SCS) than control subjects and ii) whether the presence o...

A pathogenic link between erectile dysfunction (ED) and metabolic syndrome (MetS) is now well established. Nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), the hepatic hallmark of MetS, is regarded as an active player in the pathogenesis of MetS-associated cardiovascular disease (CVD). This study was aimed at evaluating the relationship between MetS-induced NASH and penile dysfunction. We used a non-genomic, high fat diet (HFD)-induced, rabbit model of MetS, and treated HFD rabbits with t...

The metabolic syndrome (MetS) is a clustering of metabolic and cardiovascular risk factors, having in insulin resistance the key element. In males, MetS is also associated to hypogonadism. We recently found that high fat diet (HFD)-induced MetS rabbits also developed hypogonadotropic hypogonadism, showing a reduced immunopositivity for gonadotropin relasing hormone (GnRH) in the hypothalamus. In this study, we investigated the pathogenetic link between Mets components and the ...