Clinical evaluation of pituitary insufficiency in adult population

Abstract

Background/aim: This retrospective study aimed to investigate the clinical profile of pituitary insufficiency (PI) in adult population.Materials and methods: One hundred and fifty patients who were diagnosed as having PI between 2012 and 2018 (53.3% female, meanage 48.13 ± 15.83 years) were retrospectively analyzed.Results: Age at diagnosis was higher in females as compared with males (51.13 ± 15.95 vs. 44.70 ± 15.08 years, P = 0.012). The mostfrequent presenting signs were headache (29.4%) and visual disturbance (19.6%) in general. Females frequently presented with headache(33.3%), whereas males presented with sexual dysfunction (34.4%). The most frequent cause of PI was nonfunctional pituitary adenoma(28.8%) in general population. A frequent cause of PI was Sheehan’s syndrome (33.8%) among females and nonfunctional pituitaryadenoma (38.6%) among males. Pituitary macroadenoma (75.8%) was frequent in pituitary tumors with PI. 55.3 % of the patients had 4pituitary hormones deficiencies and 26.0% of patients had 3 pituitary hormones deficiencies. Gonadotropin deficiency was the leadingpituitary hormone deficiency. The frequency of posttraumatic PI was 4.7% in the general population.Conclusion: Nonfunctional pituitary adenoma was the most common cause of PI among males and Sheehan’s syndrome was a majoretiologic factor in females. Sheehan’s syndrome remains an important health problem in Turkey although obstetric care has improved.Posttraumatic PI should be considered in the differential diagnosis of idiopathic PI.