Midnight Salivary Cortisol Determination for Assessing the Outcome of Transsphenoidal Surgery in Cushing?s Disease

[~MaryO~]

Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, doi:10.1210/jc.2008-1171

The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism Vol. 93, No. 12 4728-4734

Copyright ? 2008 by The Endocrine Society

 

Midnight Salivary Cortisol Determination for Assessing the Outcome of Transsphenoidal Surgery in Cushing?s Disease

 

Carmen A. Carrasco, Jo?l Coste, Laurence Guignat, Lionel Groussin, Marie Annick Dugu?, St?phane Gaillard, Xavier Bertagna and J?r?me Bertherat

 

Service des Maladies Endocriniennes et M?taboliques, Centre de R?f?rence de Maladies Rares des surr?nales (C.A.C., L.Gu., L.Gr., X.B., J.B.), Service de Biostatistique (J.C.), and Service d?Hormonologie (M.A.D.), Assistance Publique-H?pitaux de Paris, H?pital Cochin, 75014 Paris, France; Institut National de la Sant? et de la Recherche M?dicale Unit 567, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique Unit? Mixte de Recherche 8104, (C.A.C., L.Gr., X.B., J.B.), Institut Cochin, 75014 Paris, France; Universit? Paris Descrates (J.C., M.A.D., L.Gr., X.B., J.B.), 75270 Paris, France; and Service de Neurochirurgie (S.G.), H?pital Foch, 92150 Suresnes, France

 

Address all correspondence and requests for reprints to: Prof. J?r?me Bertherat, Service des Maladies Endocriniennes et M?taboliques, H?pital Cochin, 27 rue du Faubourg Saint-Jacques, 75014 Paris, France. E-mail: jerome.bertherat@cch.aphp.fr.

 

Context: Midnight salivary cortisol (MSC) is now recognized as a reliable index for Cushing?s syndrome diagnosis but has to be validated for the follow-up of treated patients.

 

Objective: Our objective was to evaluate MSC for assessing the outcome of transsphenoidal surgery (TSS) in patients with Cushing?s disease (CD).

 

Design: We conducted a retrospective cohort study in a single center.

 

Patients and Methods: Sixty-eight patients treated by TSS between 1996 and 2006 and followed for at least 6 months with postoperative MSC were included. Mean follow-up (? SD) was 45 ? 31 months. Morning plasma cortisol was determined 5 d after TSS, and MSC and urinary cortisol (UC) were determined 6?12 months after surgery. The remission group included hypocortisolic (morning plasma cortisol < 50 ng/ml and/or insufficient response to cosyntropin) and eucortisolic (midnight plasma cortisol < 75 ng/ml and normal UC) patients. Patients in the treatment failure group had high midnight plasma cortisol and UC concentrations.

Results: Fifty patients (74%) were in remission. Mean MSC was 0.7 ? 0.4 ng/ml (range, 0.4?2.1 ng/ml) and 6.5 ? 6.5 ng/ml (range, 2.1?27.2 ng/ml) for the remission and treatment failure groups, respectively (P = 0.001). A cutoff of 2 ng/ml for MSC gave a sensitivity of 100% and a specificity of 98% for treatment failure diagnosis, whereas UC less than 90 ?g/d had a sensitivity of 71% and specificity of 98%. Postsurgical morning plasma cortisol less than or equal to 18 ng/ml had a sensitivity of 93% and specificity of 74%.

 

Conclusions: MSC is a simple, robust marker of remission after TSS for CD.

 

http://jcem.endojournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/93/12/4728

[casperslove]

Interesting. Wonder if it really works. Wonder if my PCP would order it for me to try it out.

[missaf]

My PCP just told me today about Dr. F and his orders for midnight salivaries: "Finally, someone who believes in these!"

[worriedmom]

11:00 pm salivaries were the first consistently high tests that Kelsey could get. Months and months later she got highs from other tests, as well, but I always felt that the salivary tests were crucial in her diagnosis, not to mention the first real validation we were getting for a few months.

 

Now, with an apparent cure (please, God!), they are rock bottom.

 

Diane

[sowens]

Like the rest of the tests, they don't work all the time for everyone. Such a strange disease...