Endocrine Abstracts

Background and objectives: Metyrapone has been approved for the treatment of patients with Cushing’s syndrome from all causes, but only few retrospective clinical studies are available. The aim of our study was the prospective assessment of metyrapone as pre-operative treatment.Methods: Before adrenalectomy, 7 patients with ACTH-independent Cushing’s syndrome due to adrenal adenoma were prospectively treated with metyrapone for 3 months, with e...

Many patients affected by SARS-CoV-2 disease (COVID) have associated comorbidities (arterial hypertension, obesity, diabetes mellitus, thrombophilia) that are also tied to autonomous cortisol secretion. However, the prevalence of diseases of the adrenal glands in COVID patients is presently unknown. Since the visualization of the adrenal glands is almost always available in chest CT performed in patients with suspected or confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection, the evaluation of adren...

Background: More than 50% of adrenocortical carcinomas (ACC) in adults are associated with cortisol excess that makes tumor management challenging and has a negative impact on patient outcome. Abiraterone acetate (AA) is an irreversible inhibitor of the 17α-hydroxylase/C17, 20-lyase (CYP17 enzyme) that is used in patients with prostate cancer, in whom it leads to suppression of cortisol and androgens. The aim of this study was to assess the activity of AA to control corti...

Objective: Various features have been identified as predictors of relapse after complete resection of pheochromocytoma, but a comprehensive multivariable model for recurrence risk prediction is lacking. The aim of this study was to develop and internally validate an integrated predictive model for post-surgical recurrence of pheochromocytoma.Methods: The present research retrospectively enrolled 177 patients affected by pheochromocytoma and submitted to ...

Background and objective: Mitotane is the main option of treatment for advanced adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC). However, limited evidence is available regarding practical management of mitotane treatment and its eventual combination with chemotherapy or radiotherapy. The aim of the study is to do a survey on the use of mitotane for advanced ACC in expert Italian centers, analyzing data of the LYSOSAFE database.Methods: Retrospective analysis of patients ...

Background: Adjuvant mitotane therapy is frequently used in Europe following surgery for adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC). Management of adjuvant mitotane is mainly empirical and a major open question is the optimal duration of therapy, because no study has ever addressed this issue.Objective: We aimed to assess the outcome of ACC patients who were treated with adjuvant mitotane for at least one year following surgery and then discontinued therapy for othe...

Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is a rare tumor with poor prognosis and the only approved drug for advanced disease is mitotane. The cytochromes P450 (CYP) 2W1 and 2B6 are proposed predicting markers of sensitivity to mitotane treatment. Aim of the study was to evaluate the relationship between CYP2W1 and/or CYP2B6 polymorphisms and response to mitotane in ACC.Methods: We performed a multicentric retrospective study including 182 ACC patients (F/M=121/61)...

Introduction: Available literature on series of patients affected by ectopic Cushing’s syndrome (ECS) deriving from neuroendocrine tumours (NETs) is relatively scarce. This is the first Italian multicentre study regarding clinicopathologic features, modalities of treatment, and survival of patients with NETs and ECS.Patients and methods: Retrospective analysis of data from patients with ECS from NETs collected in 14 centres between 1986 and 2014, ob...

Background: The human cytochrome P450 (CYP) 2W1 is involved in the metabolism of several endogenous substrates, including lysophospholipids and fatty acids. Using a polyclonal antibody, we previously demonstrated a high CYP2W1 immunoreactivity in adrenocortical tumors, particularly in those secreting steroids. The aim of the study was to better elucidate the relationship between CYP2W1 and steroid secretion in adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) H295R cell line and in a larger seri...

Introduction: The need of a long-term follow-up in adrenal incidentalomas (AI) is debated and data on cardiovascular events (CVE) are lacking.Methods: In this retrospective study all patients referred to seven Italian Endocrine Centers for AI, without signs of hypercortisolism at baseline and with a ≥5 years follow-up (80.7±30 months, range 60–286), were enrolled. From 171 patients (121 F) aged 59.5±10.2 years (range 25–79) the ...