ACTA ENDOCRINOLOGICA (BUC)

Long lasting hypocalcemia, hyperphosphatemia, low calcitriol and high fibroblast growth factor 23 could result in progressive parathyroid gland hyperplasia with high, uncontrolled, parathormone production, e.g. severe secondary hyperparathyroidism (sHPT), in 10% of dialysis patients. Parathyroidectomy (PTX) could be a solution, but has inherent (low) surgical risks and although dramatically decreases parathormone levels, could induce hypoparathyroidism (50-66%) and low turnover bone disease. Moreover, the rate of recurrences is 15-20% at 10 years. Total and subtotal PTX with autografting are equally safe and effective with similar recurrences rates. Calcimimetics are efficient drugs, but with limited effectiveness in sHPT, as only 25% of patients responded to cinacalcet. In the USA, they are more cost-effective than PTX only in patients with >2 years expected dialysis duration. As there are not randomized studies to compare surgical to medical therapy, the strength of evidence allows only for suggestions in guidelines. In countries like Romania, where dialysis vintage is high because of the low transplantation rate and calcimimetics are costly, PTX seems a better solution when parathyroid glands are large (diameter >1cm or\r\ntotal mass >500mg), parathormone levels >800pg/mL, in patients who are not candidates for renal transplantation or are anticipated to stay >2 years on dialysis.

Background. Primary hyperparathyroidism (PHPT) is caused most commonly by a solitary adenoma and less commonly by multiglandular hyperplasia of the parathyroid glands (MGD). Minimally invasive parathyroidectomy (MIP) has become a frequently used strategy, but there are limitations to current preoperative localization techniques. Results. We report the case of a patient, 63 years old, female, with clinical and biochemical features of primary hyperparathyroidism (total serum calcium: 10.1mg/dL; PTH: 171pg/mL). Neck ultrasonography (USG) revealed a mixed hypoechoic tumor along the posterior aspect of the left thyroid lobe of 1.54x0.78 cm, being difficult to say if it was intrathyroidal or not. There was only minimal residual uptake in the left thyroid lobe at 4 h on Tc99m sestamibi imaging. She underwent USG-guided fine-needle aspiration (FNA) of the suspected tumor followed by PTH measurement from the needle washing (FNA-PTH). The cytology was non-diagnostic but the level of PTH in the aspirated fluid was 10.000 pg/ mL. The patient underwent an en bloc resection of the left thyroid lobe and the tumor, which was curative, as calcium (8.9 mg/dL) and PTH (25.52 pg/mL) decreased from the first day after surgery. Histopathology of the surgical specimen revealed a left parathyroid adenoma made of chief cells and included in the thyroid capsule together with the entire left thyroid lobe. Conclusion. This case report highlights the importance of FNA-PTH in the localization of functionally parathyroid tissue in difficult cases, where a clear target exists.