ESPE Abstracts

Background: Serious mental and physical retardation are sequelae of untreated congenital hypothyroidism. These complications have become rare since the introduction of neonatal screening in Germany.Case report: Here we report about a girl with congenital hypothyroidism, who suffered from extreme short and thickset stature, rough facial features and straw-like hair at the age of 12 years. She had been detected in newborn screening with a TSH of 132 IU/ml....

Background: More than 20 gene loci are known to cause monogenic neonatal diabetes today. A definite mutation can be found in 65–70% of all cases. Mutations in the ATP sensitive potassium channel can frequently be treated by sulfonylurea. Glibenclamide is on of the drugs known to inhibit the bile salt export pump (BSEP). However most drug induced cholestasis cases are reported in adults.Objective and hypotheses: Glibenclamide is used frequently to tr...

Background and Aim: Pediatric patients with germline mutations in the tumor suppressor gene PTEN (PTEN hamartoma tumor syndrome, PHTS) frequently develop lipomas. PTEN antagonizes phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K) signaling, which can induce adipogenesis upon activation through insulin. The PI3K downstream target AKT can deactivate FOXO1 via phosphorylation, initiating the expression of the lipogenesis activating transcription factor SREBP1. To study t...

Background: Pediatric patients with germline pathogenic variants in the tumor suppressor gene PTEN frequently develop cancer and adipose tissue overgrowth in the form of lipomas. While the canonical function of the phosphatase PTEN is to antagonize the growth promoting PI3K pathway, non-canonical PTEN functions e.g. in the nucleus are less well described. To uncover the mechanisms leading to lipoma formation related to PTEN mutations, we previously performed R...

Background: Obesity is characterized by an increase in fat mass caused by an increase in adipocyte number and adipocyte size and is often associated with adipose tissue (AT) dysfunction contributing to metabolic impairment. It is suspected that adipocyte progenitor cells play an important role during healthy and obesity-related AT expansion. Studies in adults showed that the stroma vascular fraction (SVF) of AT is composed of different progenitor cell subpopul...

Congenital hyperinsulinism (CHI) is a complex heterogeneous disease affecting 1 in 40.000 newborns. Recurrent hypoketotic hypoglycaemia led to permanent mental and motor disabilities in 30-40% of children. Histologically three types had been differentiated: focal, diffuse and atypical. Up to now, only focal-type CHI can be permanently cured by focus removal. Focal-type CHI is characterized by paternal inherited mutation of ABCC8 or KCNJ11 mutations. Therefore mutation anal...

Background and Objective: Obesity is known to affect pubertal timing. However, existing data are still controversial, observing either delayed or accelerated pubertal onset, especially among boys. Herein, we evaluated pubertal milestones and underlying hormonal changes between lean and obese children.Material and Methods: We examined 13,484 events from 4,855 lean (BMI SDS <1.28) and 1,983 obese (BMI SDS > 1.88) c...

Background/aim: The PTEN hamartoma tumor syndrome (PHTS) is an overgrowth syndrome caused mainly by germline mutations in the tumor suppressor PTEN. Patients are predisposed for the development of malignant and benign tumors. Children and adolescents with PHTS frequently develop single or multiple lipomas. PTEN antagonizes the phosphatidylinositide3-kinase/AKT/mechanistic target of rapamycin (PI3K/AKT/mTOR) pathway, which promotes proliferation and differentiation in ...

Background: The leptin signaling cascade is a crucial regulator of satiety and energy homeostasis in the hypothalamus, comprising extracellular leptin binding to its receptor, phosphorylation and nuclear translocation of STAT3 (signal transducer and activator of transcription 3) and consecutively the generation of a central satiety signal via neuropeptide secretion. We identified three variants in the extracellular domains of the LEPR gene in two children with severe ...

Background/aim: Sorafenib® is a multi-kinase inhibitor and one of the few systemic treatment options for patients with advanced hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs). Resistance to Sorafenib® develops frequently and could be mediated by the NAD dependent deacetylase sirtuin (SIRT) 1, a master regulator of cellular energy metabolism and stress responses. We aimed to find out if Sorafenib® treatment depends on changes in cellular NAD le...