Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Dexamethasone significantly improved outcomes in patients requiring supplementary oxygen and in ventilated patients with COVID-19 in the RECOVERY trial. Consequently, dexamethasone is now routinely used in these patients. However, dysglycaemia is commonly associated with steroid use and is an established risk factor for poorer outcomes in COVID-19. In this study, we aimed to elucidate the effect of dexamethasone use in patients hospitalised with COVID-19 in a real-...

A 24-year-old woman presented with stridor resulting from a large, firm, anterior neck mass. At age six she had been treated for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) with vincristine, prednisolone, daunorubicin, asparaginase, prophylactic cranial radiotherapy and intrathecal methotrexate. She also had primary hypothyroidism with strongly positive thyroid peroxidase antibodies.The mass had been gradually enlarging for 6 months, causing exertional breathles...

Male Hypogonadism (MH) is a clinical and biochemical diagnosis, comprising pathologically low serum testosterone (T) levels and clinical features of androgen deficiency, of which low muscle mass and increased fat mass are features. The diagnosis is most secure when framed in the context of a recognised clinical syndrome, or with male factor infertility from impaired gonadal function. Testosterone levels in individual males are subject to considerable v...

Anecdotal evidence suggests that athletes have been misusing growth hormone (GH) for its anabolic, lipolytic, psychological and cardiovascular effects since the early 1980s, at least a decade before endocrinologists began to treat adults with GH deficiency. There have been on-going debates about whether GH is performance-enhancing. Although many of the early studies were negative, randomized controlled...

Glucocorticoids (GC) are involved recruiting the energetic response to stress and act principally via the glucocorticoid receptor (GR). The GR is classically understood to function as a nuclear transcription factor. However, the nuclear genome is not the only genome in eukaryotic cells. The mitochondria also contain a small circular chromosome – the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) – that encodes 13 proteins. It has been established that, in the brain and other systems, the...

Chemotherapy and radiotherapy can both cause ovarian failure, and radiotherapy can also damage the uterus increasing the risk of miscarriage and premature delivery. Alkylating agents are recognised to be the most gonadotoxic class of chemotherapeutic agents, but treatment regimens often involve multiple drugs complicating assessment of effect and risk. The prepubertal reproductive system is also sensitive to these effects, although age, with treatment regimen, are important de...

Reproduction is our biological reason for being. Evolution has shaped us via countless millennia with this one purpose in mind. Our development from an early embryo through to adulthood is geared to making us fit to reproduce, a process that is closely connected to nutrition and energy stores. Seasonal and other fluctuations in food supply has been a key evolutionary shaper of the reproductive process, as illustrated by seasonal breeding species. Humans have echoes of this sea...

Glucocorticoids (GC) are involved recruiting the energetic response to stress and act principally via the glucocorticoid receptor (GR). The GR is classically understood to function as a nuclear transcription factor. However, the nuclear genome is not the only genome in eukaryotic cells. The mitochondria also contain a small circular chromosome – the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) – that encodes 13 proteins. It has been established that, in the brain and other systems, the...

Chemotherapy and radiotherapy can both cause ovarian failure, and radiotherapy can also damage the uterus increasing the risk of miscarriage and premature delivery. Alkylating agents are recognised to be the most gonadotoxic class of chemotherapeutic agents, but treatment regimens often involve multiple drugs complicating assessment of effect and risk. The prepubertal reproductive system is also sensitive to these effects, although age, with treatment regimen, are important de...

Reproduction is our biological reason for being. Evolution has shaped us via countless millennia with this one purpose in mind. Our development from an early embryo through to adulthood is geared to making us fit to reproduce, a process that is closely connected to nutrition and energy stores. Seasonal and other fluctuations in food supply has been a key evolutionary shaper of the reproductive process, as illustrated by seasonal breeding species. Humans have echoes of this sea...