ESPE Abstracts

Current hormone substitution therapy of patients with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) is suboptimal and cannot mimic physiological daily rhythms of hormone secretion. As supra-physiological corticoid doses are necessary to avoid adrenal androgen excess, patients show substantially increased comorbidities such as hyperglycemia, arterial hypertension, reduced growth and osteoporosis. Moreover plasma ACTH is often inadequately suppressed, resulting in undesired excess adrena...

Context: Prenatal dexamethasone (Dex) therapy is used in female foetuses with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) to suppress adrenal androgen excess and prevent virilisation of the external genitalia. The prenatal dexamethasone dose of 20 µg/kg/d has been used for decades in prenatal CAH. Despite the risks for the treated mother and potentially for the unborn child, no clinical study or evaluation had been conducted in order to determine a Dex dose with a scientific rat...

Introduction: Prenatal dexamethasone (Dex) therapy in female fetuses with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) has been conducted for 40 years but the dose given to the pregnant woman has never been fully evaluated in a randomized clinical trial. Prenatal Dex therapy is associated with potential side effects for both mother and child.Methods: In a study funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMB...

Background: Routine biochemical assessment in patients with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) includes measurement of serum 17 hydroxyprogesterone (17OHP), androstenedione (A4) and testosterone (T) and their metabolites in urine. Several studies have also described 11 oxygenated 19 carbon (11oxC19) steroids as a clinically relevant androgenetic source and highlighted their potential as markers for evaluation of adrenal androgen excess in patients with 21-hy...

Background: Adults with congenital adrenal hyperplasia due to 21-hydroxylase deficiency (21OHD) develop an adverse metabolic and cardiovascular risk profile. Both over- and undertreatment with glucocorticoids are associated with these adverse metabolic effects. There is limited data available of changes in cardiovascular parameters during lifetime.Objective: This study aimed to evaluate unfavorable changes in cardiovascu...

Introduction: The aim of the project “DSDCare” is to implement standardized care for people with DSD following national and international guidelines and to evaluate structural, process and outcome quality of care at 10 specialized centres in Germany from May 2020 till June 2023. Transition from paediatric to adult care is a crucial phase in chronic and rare conditions. In DSD, “loss to follow-up” is usually not associated with acute com...

21-hydroxylase deficiency (21OHD) is the most common form of congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) and is caused by mutations in the CYP21A2 gene. 21OHD causes a wide array of clinical symptoms that result from gluco- and mineralocorticoid deficiency and adrenal androgen excess. In most cases, supra-physiological glucocorticoid doses are necessary which may cause short stature, obesity, hypertension, cardiovascular and metabolic co-morbidity with reduced quality of lif...

Introduction: The European Registries for Rare Endocrine Conditions (EuRRECa) was created in collaboration with the European Reference Network on Rare Endocrine Conditions (Endo-ERN), the European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology and the European Society of Endocrinology to support the needs of the endocrine community.Aim: To describe the patient population and data entered in the EuRRECa Core Registry between June 2...

Background: EuRRECa (European Registries for Rare Endocrine Conditions) is a new project incorporating the development of a core endocrine registry and the development of an e-reporting programme for rare endocrine conditions (e-REC) that are covered within Endo-ERN (https://eurreca.net/e-rec/).Methods: 24 Endo-ERN centres within 12 countries participated in a pilot phase of e-REC...

Background: Klinefelter syndrome (KS) is associated with an increased risk of lower socioeconomic status and a higher risk for morbidity and mortality, which may have a significant impact on quality of life (QOL). The objective of this study is to investigate QOL in a large European cohort of men with KS and associate QOL with socioeconomic status, prevalence of somatic disease and mental illness, testosterone supplementation and age of diagnosis.<p class=...