Endocrine Abstracts

Purpose: Growth Hormone (GH) and Insulin-like Growth Factor 1 (IGF-I) are currently the principal biomarkers used to assess disease activity in acromegaly and any discrepancy between them renders interpretation of results inconclusive. The purpose of this study was to assess the frequency of discrepant results and identify parameters that might affect the emergence of this phenomenon.Methods: A systematic review of Medline and Scopus was performed (1987&...

Introduction: Cushing’s disease (CD) is associated with significant morbidity and mortality due to cerebro-cardiovascular, thrombotic or infectious complications. However, there is significant variation in the clinical presentation and consequences of hypercortisolism, resulting in a wide clinical spectrum, ranging from mild to severe or even life-threatening disease requiring immediate treatment.Aim: The description of patients with severe CD in c...

Patients on long term glucocorticoid replacement therapy have higher rates of morbidity and mortality. One causative factor may be non-physiological cortisol replacement. We have developed as part of the ULTRADIAN consortium (https://www.uib.no/en/ultradian) the U-RHYTHM, an ambulatory bio-sampling device that can collect clinical samples using in-vivo microdialysis every 20 minutes over the 24hour day whilst individuals continue with their normal everyday activities....

Radioiodine treatment is the cornerstone of differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC) management. A number of thyroid cancers, however, become radioiodine-refractory (RAIR) and these represent about 60% of advanced DTCs and are responsible for the vast majority of DTC mortality. RAIR DTC has limited therapeutic options, mainly tyrosine kinase inhibitors that are associated with moderate efficacy and considerable toxicity. Reinducing NIS expression (redifferentiation) with the aim of...

Introduction: Somatostatin analogues (SSAs) are the mainstay of treatment for carcinoid syndrome (CS)-related symptoms. Controversy still exists regarding the extent of the efficacy of this intervention. The purpose of the systematic review and meta-analysis was to evaluate the percentage of patients achieving partial (PR) or complete response (CR) with the use of SSAs (lanreotide, octreotide, pasireotide) in patients with CS. Due to lack of uniformity and established criteria...

Purpose: HPA axis activation resulting in increased cortisol production by the adrenals is a crucial part of the response to critical illness. The action of cortisol may also be modulated at the tissue level, through changes in the availability of the free fraction and modifications of the glucocorticoid receptor activity. It has been proposed that tissue resistance to glucocorticoids may occur, at least in some patients, and relate to insufficient anti-inflammatory activity a...

Objective: Somatic mutations in the GNAS1 gene, which encodes the alpha-subunit of G stimulatory proteins (gsp), are frequently detected in somatotroph pituitary tumors and have been associated to specific clinical-smaller and less invasive tumors occurring in older patients- and histopathological-densely granulated adenomas- characteristics. However, the question whether the presence of a somatic gsp mutation affects the response to somatostatin analogue treatment remains unr...

Introduction: The hypothalamo-pituitary adrenal axis has been extensively investigated in sepsis. Most studies concentrated in the acute phase and in most the high-dose ACTH stimulation test has been applied. Studies extending in the post-acute phase by using the more physiological low-dose ACTH stimulation are scarce.We aimed to investigate the time course of cortisol levels before and after stimulation with 1μg Synacthen in mechanically ventilated...

The primary aim of this study, the largest European, single evaluation, observational trial to date, was to evaluate the impact of acromegaly on health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in patients with biochemically documented active disease, receiving Sandostatin® LAR® at a dose prescribed by their physician for at least 3 months. Secondary objectives were to investigate the relationships between HRQoL and subpopulations based on exploratory var...

Background: An increasing number of mutations are associated with pheochromocytomas. Genetic screening is advocated in all cases and immunohistochemistry as well as phenotype profile recognition may permit a more targeted screening for specific genes.Case Presentation: A 54-year-old male presented with symptoms compatible with pheochromocytoma and increased levels of plasma normetanephrines, metanephrines and 3-methoxytyramine. On Computed Tomography, th...