ESPE Abstracts

The pandemic has changed habits in families around the world. Eating habits and physical activity were directly impacted by social distance. The first year of the pandemic left its mark on children’s health. The purpose of this analysis was to evaluate the relationship between the first year of the pandemic and the serum lipid profile in children who underwent lab tests in a private laboratory in Curitiba-PR.Methods: Observational a...

Introduction: Delayed puberty (DP), affecting over 2% of adolescents, is defined as pubertal onset 2-2.5 SDs later than the general population. The most common underlying aetiology is self-limited DP (SLDP). However, this can be difficult to differentiate from the more severe condition congenital hypogonadotrophic hypogonadism (HH), especially on first presentation of an adolescent patient with DP. This study sought to elucidate phenotypic and genotypic discre...

Introduction: Acromesomelic dysplasia, type Maroteaux (AMDM) is a rare autosomal recessive skeletal dysplasia, characterized by severe dwarfism and disproportionate shortening of the extremities, predominantly affecting middle and distal limb segments. It results from loss-of-function mutations affecting the C-type natriuretic peptide (CNP) receptor (NPR-B), a transmembrane guanylyl cyclase receptor encoded by the NPR2 gene. Resistance to growth hormo...

Background: The initiation of puberty is orchestrated by the augmentation in the secretion of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) from a few thousand neurons located in the hypothalamus. Recent findings identified that the neuroendocrine control of puberty is regulated by a network of transcriptional factors hierarchically organized, but this still remains not fully elucidated. Enhanced At Puberty 1 (EAP1) is one of the main regulators of pubertal onset and it is ex...

Background: Aberrations in the timing of puberty may result in significant adverse health outcomes, including cancers, cardiovascular and neurological pathologies. Self-limited delayed puberty (DP) (i.e. constitutional delay of puberty) runs in families with either autosomal dominant or complex inheritance patterns in >70% of families, indicating a strong genetic basis of the trait. However, only a few genes have been identified underlying DP so far....

Background: Craniopharyngioma is a benign tumour that develops in the sellar and surrounding parasellar regions, including the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland responsible for the production and regulation of neuropeptides. Oxytocin is a hypothalamic neuropeptide that has been identified as a key modulator of appetite drive and social cognition. Here, we present a case of parent-observed improvements in neurobehavioural dysfunction following administration...

Glucocorticoids (cortisol in humans, corticosterone in rodents) are critical regulators of energy metabolism and immunity. Their secretion by the adrenal gland follows a circadian pattern, with serum concentrations peaking before the active phase (day in humans, night in rodents). Synthetic glucocorticoids are the most potent anti-inflammatory agents known, and are widely used therapeutically, with >1% of the UK population holding a prescription long-term. However, frequen...

Background: Animal studies have reported that exposure to synthetic glucocorticoids (sGCs) may lead to inter- and transgenerational effects on offspring phenotype. However, many of these studies are poorly designed, do not account for possible non-epigenetic confounds, and cannot determine the mechanism(s) by which gamete epimutations are induced.Objectives: Firstly, to determine whether developmental exposure of mice to...

Introduction: Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) is most often caused by 21-hydroxylase deficiency (21OHD: 95%) or by 11-hydroxylase deficiency (11OHD). Classic CAH results in impaired cortisol production and consequently elevated ACTH concentrations leading to chronic adrenal stimulation with strongly elevated adrenal steroid precursors before the enzymatic defect. In contrast to other forms of adrenal insufficiency, some untreated classic CAH patients seem to have less cli...

Background: Glucocorticoids play an important role in the developing fetus, the most important of which is lung maturation by increasing surfactant production and release. Glucocorticoid receptor (GR) functioning changes throughout the fetal period, especially during the transition to extrauterine life. Given the importance of glucocorticoids in lung development and functioning, studying glucocorticoid sensitivity in this population would be helpful, especially in the preterm ...