Comparison of the low dose short synacthen test (1 microg), the conventional dose short synacthen test (250 microg), and the insulin tolerance test for assessment of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis in patients with pituitary disease

What Was Tested

Researchers studied Cosyntropin in this randomized controlled trial publication.

The purpose of this study was to assess the clinical usefulness of LDSST compared to SST and ITT in patients with pituitary disease.

Why It Was Studied

There is still uncertainty about what is the most appropriate test for assessment of the integrity of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis.

Many advocate the insulin tolerance test (ITT), but this is unpleasant and resource intensive, and may occasionally give misleading results.

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 64 patients taking part.

By PubMed's age tags, the people studied were adults, middle-aged adults and older adults.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized study.

Because people in this Cosyntropin study were split into groups at random, differences between the groups are less likely to reflect who happened to join each one.

What Was Measured

There is still uncertainty about what is the most appropriate test for assessment of the integrity of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis.

Many advocate the insulin tolerance test (ITT), but this is unpleasant and resource intensive, and may occasionally give misleading results.

The subject headings attached to it are Cosyntropin, Evaluation Studies as Topic, Hypothalamo-Hypophyseal System, Insulin, Insulin Resistance, Pituitary Diseases and Pituitary-Adrenal System.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized study of Cosyntropin in 64 patients.

The publication is from 1999 (The Journal of clinical endocrinology and metabolism), a journal based in United States.

More context: the Cosyntropin compound page, all human trials.