ESPE Abstracts

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: N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors (NMDARs) are ionotropic glutamate receptors that are widely expressed in the CNS where they play an important role in neurotransmission and cell viability and serve as drug targets for the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders.Objective and hypotheses: Much less is known about the role of pancreatic NMDARs. Since neurons and pancreatic islets have many features in common, we hypothesiz...

Dyslipidemia is a well-known risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD). Although familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) has an important impact on CVD, most people with FH are undiagnosed or diagnosed only after their first coronary event. Therefore, early identification of affected individuals is crucial. Total cholesterol levels alone are not sufficient to confirm a diagnosis of FH, because of the extensive overlap in LDL–C levels existing between FH-causing mutation ca...

Background: Girls with Turner Syndrome (TS) are at an increased risk of primary ovarian failure. Oestrogen replacement is commenced at around the age of 12 years, in girls who do not enter puberty spontaneously, with incremental changes to the dose over the next 3 years until adult replacement doses are achieved. We have previously shown good correlation between serum and urinary LH (uLH) and FSH (uFSH) in children being assessed for disorders of puberty.<...

Background: Insulin degludec (IDeg; Tresiba®) is a novel basal insulin with an ultra-long, flat and stable action profile. In adults, it provides a more consistent glucose-lowering effect and lower rates of hypoglycaemia than glargine (IGlar). Data on children and adolescents are scarce.Objective and hypotheses: To assess efficacy of IDeg among children and adolescents affected by type 1 diabetes (T1DM) previously on IGlar.Met...

Background: Dyslipidaemia is a well-known risk factor in developing cardiovascular disease (CVD) already in childhood.Objective and hypotheses: To investigate the clustering of cardiovascular risk-factors (anthropometric parameters, blood pressure and metabolic abnormalities) in different type of dyslipidaemia in children and adolescents.Method: All the subjects aging 2–18 years referred for dyslipidaemia to our endocrine outp...

Background: Phthalates are ubiquitous environmental contaminants and endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs). Nowadays, they are considered reproductive toxicants and in-utero exposure is well documented, although evidence of early life exposure is scarce, and needs to be described. Aim of this study is to assess phthalate exposure and its changes over the first months of life in a cohort of healthy full term infants and their mothers from a restricted area of t...

Background: The activation of the hypothalamus-pituitary-gonadal (HPG) axis during the first months both in males(M) and females(F) is named as minipuberty. Urinary gonadotropins (uGn) represent an unexpensive and non-invasive method of assessing pubertal development and they have recently been used also for studying minipuberty.Aims of the study are: 1) to describe the urinary hormonal pattern (uLH, uFSH, testosterone – uT, oestra...

Background: Adult survivors from childhood malignancy are prone to accelerated atherogenesis and cardiovascular (CV) complications. In this population reliable tools are needed to detect preclinical onset of CV disease.Aim: To assess subclinical markers of inflammation and endothelial dysfunction in young survivors from acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) treated with chemotherapy without cranial irradiation (AIEOP 2000 a...

Background: Preterm infants born VLBW can display auxological impairment and long term cognitive disabilities. These outcomes are influenced by the condition of being small for gestational age (SGA), but also by the extra-uterine growth restriction (EUGR). Aim of the study was to detect the influence of gestational age(GA), perinatal growth trend and enteral nutrition during the hospitalization on cognitive and auxological outcomes at peri-pubertal age (PPA).<...