ESPE Abstracts

Background: CS is characterized by excess glucocorticoid excess, either endogenous or exogenous. In children younger than 7 years, the adrenal origin is the most common cause. From this age until adulthood predominates Cushing’s disease (central cause). We can divide CS in ACTH-dependent and independent according to laboratory findings. When ACTH-independent, etiologies are related to benign or malignant diseases of the adrenal or McCune Albright syndrome.<p class="ab...

Background: Craniosynostosis, defined as the premature fusion of the cranial sutures, presents many challenges in aetiology. One known form associated to steroid biosynthesis impairment is the Antley-Bixler Syndrome (ABS). ABS-phenotype and normal steroidogenesis have FGFR mutations, whereas those with ambiguous genitalia and altered steroidogenes should be recognized as possibly having P450 oxidoreductase deficiency, with mild do moderate 17 OH progesterone (17HOP) elevation ...

Background and Aims: A pre-clinical stage of type 1 diabetes (T1D) often precedes by many years the overt clinical symptoms. Diagnosis during this period is often difficult and is based on the presence of specific islet autoantibodies in the subject's blood. First-degree relatives of patients with T1D were tested using the 3 Screen ICA TM ELISA (RSR Ltd) for combined testing for autoantibodies to GAD65 (glutamic acid decarboxylase, 65kDa isoform), ZnT8 (z...

Background: Obesity has increased drastically in the last few years. It’s well known the connection between intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) and the development of metabolic syndrome based on the thrifty phenotype. Some studies have proposed that a poor intrauterine environment could lead to the development of chronic conditions later in life, and its believed leptin is involved in this process.Objective and hypotheses: Establish the mean of l...

Background: Pancreatic epithelial cells represent an attractive cell source for replacement therapy of type 1 diabetes. Previously, we designed a protocol for expansion of human pancreatic duct-derived cells (HDDCs) and showed their β-cell engineering potential.Objective and hypotheses: In this study, we reprogrammed HDDCs into β-cell-like lineage by over-expressing mRNAs of key pancreatic transcription factors (TFs).Meth...

Background: The annual worldwide incidence of childhood adrenocortical tumors (ACT) ranges from 0.3 to 0.38/million children below the age of 15 years. Only 1–2% of them are feminizing ACT occurring in prepubertal boys and presenting with gynecomastia that normalizes after tumor removal.Case report: We present a case of a feminizing ACT. The boy was referred for bilateral gynecomastia, appeared 6 months before, at the chronological age (CA) of 7.5 y...

Background: Klippel–Feil syndrome (KFS) is characterized by congenital fusion of cervical vertebrae and has a prevalence of 1:50 000. The phenotypic expression is variable, sometimes presenting with extraskeletal symptoms.Case report: A girl was referred at the cronological age (CA) of 10.3 years with a suspected diagnosis of Turner syndrome, due to the presence of webbed neck and progressive deceleration of growth velocity. The girl, born in Russia...

Background: Published studies of radiologically confirmed fractures in sufficiently large cohorts of boys with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) are limited.Objective: To determine the incidence of fractures in a contemporary cohort of 91 boys with DMD managed in all Scottish centres.Method: Radiologically confirmed fractures were classified into vertebral fracture (VF) and non-VF in a retrospective audit of all boys currently mana...

Background: The diagnosis of GH deficiency (GHD) is not straightforward in childhood and adolescence, requiring comprehensive clinical, anthropometric, biochemical, endocrine, and neuroradiological assessment. Although pharmacological GH stimulation tests are still considered the gold standard for GHD diagnosis, they are burdened by both poor specificity and side effects. Several studies have addressed the issue of sensitivity and specificity of IGFBP-3 assess...

Background: Constitutional delay of growth and puberty (CDGP) is one of the most frequent norm variants in children presenting with short stature. Knowing the height, growth, and weight pattern of CDGP in the first years of life is important to distinguish CDGP from growth hormone deficiency (GHD) or other diseases.Methods: We studied height and weight in the first 5 years of life in 54 boys with CDGP including measureme...