ESPE Abstracts

Background: The male Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Gonadal (HPG) axis is transiently active during the first months of life with surging serum concentrations of reproductive hormones. This period, termed minipuberty, promotes masculinization, including testicular, and penile growth, as well as further testicular descent in males. It appears to be essential for priming specific cell types, i.e. Sertoli-, Leydig-, and germ cells, including subsequent growth and maturat...

Introduction: Post-marketing surveillance registries provided extensive information about the safety and efficacy of daily growth hormone (GH) therapy during treatment. With the availability of novel long-acting GH (LAGH) therapies, it is important to determine whether the novel molecules or the different pattern of GH exposure lead to changes in the efficacy and safety profile. Therefore, new surveillance registries of LAGH are warranted.<p class="abstext...

Introduction: According to EAU's guidelines, hypospadias (HS) repair is best performed between 6 and 18 months of age. Little is known about the long-term patient satisfaction or urological outcome following HS surgery.Aims: To examine the psychosexual and urological outcome of young adult men (16-21 years old) born with all forms of non-syndromic HS as compared to healthy controls, as well as patient and parental sa...

Introduction: Limited, small-scale studies have revealed that men with proximal hypospadias (HS) or with other signs of undermasculinisation (i.e. complex HS) are at risk of reduced fertility and/or impaired testicular hormone synthesis. However, the extent of this phenomenon and if milder forms of isolated HS are also affected, remains unclear.Aims: To explore reproductive hormones and semen quality of young men (16-21 ...

Background: Idiopathic central precocious puberty (CPP) is mostly described as an isolated entity. A few studies have shown its association with clinical syndromes and rare cases of chromosomal abnormalities.Objective: To clinically characterize patients with CPP, pointing out prevalent associated conditions and phenotypes.Patients and Methods: One hundred and forty-five patients with idiopathic CPP were retrospectively evaluated. ...

Background: Patients born small for gestational age (SGA) with additional syndromic features to short stature are likely to present with genetic causes.Aim: To perform a clinical and genetic-molecular investigation of a group of syndromic SGA patients without catch-up growth.Methods: We selected 118 patients born SGA [birth weight and/or length standard deviation score (SDS) ≤−2 for gestational age] without catch-up gro...

Background: Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) represents one of the most common obesity complications and can progress to non-alcoholic stetohepatitis (NASH). NASH is associated with lower insulin like growth factor I (IGF-1) and IGFBP-3, however no data are available regarding the growth hormone (GH)-IGF-I axis in early stage of NAFLD, characterised by hepatic steatosis.Objective and hypotheses: We aimed to investigate the GH-IGF-1 pathway in a ...

Introduction: Mutations in the GH1 promoter are a rare cause of isolated GH deficiency (IGHD). In order to find the molecular cause of short stature due to IGHD, three siblings (2 M) born to consanguineous parents without mutations in the GHRHR and GH1 coding regions were screened for mutations in the GH1 promoter and locus control region. All patients harbored two variants (c.−123T>C and −161C>T) in homozygous state in the GH1 promoter, not found in 100 co...

Background: Isolated Growth Hormone Deficiency (IGHD) is usually associated with a delayed bone age. A genetic cause for IGHD is more frequently found in patients with familial cases and/or consanguineous parents.Objective and hypotheses: To diagnose the genetic cause of IGHD and clarify the unusual clinical presentation of advanced bone age in one patient born to consanguineous parents.Method: Sanger sequencing of GH1, <e...

Background: Primary ovarian failure (POF) is a major cause of female infertility. POF is characterized by amenorrhea, hypo-estrogenism, and elevated gonadotrophin levels. In POF disorder, several genetic alterations have been described, however in most of the patients the etiology of this disorder remains unknown.Objective and hypotheses: To identify new genes implicated in the development of POF using whole-exome sequencing (WES)....