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Published on: September 15, 2017
Differentiating between Cushing's disease and pseudo-Cushing's syndrome: comparison of four tests
R A Alwani1, L W Schmit Jongbloed, F H de Jong
1Division of Endocrinology, Room H555, Department of Internal Medicine, Erasmus Medical Centre, PO Box 2040, 3000 CA Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Objective:
To evaluate the diagnostic performance of four different tests in order to differentiate between Cushing's disease (CD) and pseudo-Cushing's syndrome (PCS).
Methods:
In this prospective study, a total of 73 patients with clinical features of hypercortisolism and insufficient suppression of serum cortisol after 1 mg overnight dexamethasone and/or an elevated excretion of cortisol in 24-h urine samples were included. The circadian rhythm of serum cortisol levels as well as midnight serum cortisol (MserC) levels were assessed in all 73 patients. Late-night salivary cortisol (LNSC) concentrations were obtained in 44 patients. The dexamethasone-CRH (Dex-CRH) test was performed in 54 patients.
Results:
FIFTY-THREE PATIENTS WERE DIAGNOSED WITH CD AND SUBSEQUENTLY TREATED. TWENTY PATIENTS WERE CLASSIFIED AS HAVING PSC. SERUM CORTISOL CIRCADIAN RHYTHM: the diurnal rhythmicity of cortisol secretion was retained in PCS. A cortisol midnight:morning ratio of >0.67 is highly suggestive of CD (positive predictive value (PPV) 100% and negative predictive value (NPV) 73%). MserC concentration >243 nmol/l has a PPV of 98% in predicting true CD (NPV 95%). LNSC level >9.3 nmol/l predicted CD in 94% of patients (NPV 100%). Dex-CRH test: after 2 days of dexamethasone suppression, a CRH-stimulated cortisol level >87 nmol/l (T=15 min) resulted in a PPV of 100% and an NPV of 90%.
Conclusion:
The Dex-CRH test as well as a single measurement of cortisol in serum or saliva at late (mid-) night demonstrated high diagnostic accuracy in differentiating PCS from true CD.
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