ESPE Abstracts

Childhood onset of growth hormone deficiency (GHD) is a clinically heterogeneous condition and defining its cause is important for diagnostics and treatment. The most common genes implicated in the genetic etiology of growth hormone deficiency (GHD) are GH1 (MIM: 139250), encoding growth hormone (GH), and GHRHR (MIM: 139191), encoding the receptor for GHRH. GHD may also result from mutations in genes that encode transcription factors involved in pituitary dev...

Background: Mutations in the X-chromosomal androgen receptor (AR) gene, rendering the AR protein completely or partially inactive, cause complete or partial (PAIS) androgen insensitivity syndrome.Case report: The proband was born at term following uneventful pregnancy. His phallus length was 28 mm, he had palpable gonads in the lower portion of the inguinal canal, and he had a severe penoscrotal hypospadia. His karyotype was 46,XY, and molecular...

Background: Delayed puberty (DP) is generally considered a benign condition. We investigated the diagnoses underlying DP and its outcome predictors.Objective: A retrospective chart review which included clinical and biochemical data of 174 boys and 70 girls evaluated for DP in a single tertiary care center between 2004 and 2014.Results: Thirty etiologies that underlie DP were identified. No markers of clinical value could be identi...

Background: The frequency of makorin RING-finger protein 3 gene (MKRN3) mutations in Finnish patients with precocious puberty (PP) is not known. As a first step to investigate this, we describe the diagnoses underlying PP in a single academic center.Objective and hypotheses: To review the diagnoses in children who were presented with signs of PP (adrenarche excluded) at the Helsinki University Hospital, with a special emphasis on the identification of fa...

Background: Neural crest (NC) cells emerge at the interface between neural and non-neural ectoderm, and migrate extensively to form a variety of NC derivatives such as peripheral neurons, glia, melanocytes, endocrine cells, and mesenchymal precursor cells. NC cells possess various unique properties and are capable of undergoing cell fate decisions across multiple tissues and germ layers. In zebrafish and mouse, GnRH neurons are reported to arise also from NC.<p class="abst...

Background: Idiopathic central precocious puberty (ICPP) results from the premature reactivation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis leading to development of secondary sexual characteristics prior to 8 years in girls or 9 years in boys. Mutations in the maternally imprinted MKNR3 gene are the most common identified genetic cause of ICPP to date. Expression of MKRN3 in the arcuate nucleus is presumed to be inhibitory to GnRH secretion, but the exact mechanism remains un...

Background: Cryptorchidism is a risk factor for testicular cancer and poor semen quality. The incidence of cryptorchidism has been lower in Finland than in the other Nordic countries.Objective and hypotheses: We focused to investigate the recent trends in the incidence of undescended testes in the Helsinki area. In addition, we evaluated the age at orchidopexy before and after the release of the Nordic consensus in 2007 recommending operation between 6 a...

Background: Based on growth screening rules, severe short stature (i.e. height SDS less than -3), at the age of more than 3 years, warrants diagnostic evaluation in specialized health care. In the absence of apparent underlying cause, targeted and eventually untargeted genetic studies have been proposed. However, the etiology of short stature at the severe end of the spectrum is poorly characterized.Methods: We ...

Background: We describe the incidence, etiologies and clinical features of combined pituitary hormone deficiency (CPHD) in pediatric patients from a single tertiary center.Methods: The cohort comprised of patients with CPHD, treated in the Helsinki University Hospital between 1985 and 2018. They were identified through an ICD-9/ICD-10 code search, and the clinical data were recorded from the patient charts.<p class="...

Background: Little is known about the burden of disease, as evaluated by health related quality of life (HRQoL), in patients with congenital hypogonadotropic hypogonadism (CHH). We characterized the (HRQoL) in a relatively large and well-characterized population of patients with CHH using the 15D, a comprehensive preference-based generic instrument in sampling dimensions for the construct of HRQoL. 15D covers most of the ‘domains of health’ emphasized in the WHO Inte...