Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Widespread use of abdominal imaging has led to the identification of an increasing number of adrenal incidentalomas (AI) in the last decades. Causes of these adrenal masses are multiple.

Aim: The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical and hormonal characteristics of AI.

Materials and methods: The study was a retrospective monocentric analysis of 44 patients with AI who underwent radiographic and endocrine evaluations.

Results: The mean age was 59.25±10.3 years and the sex ratio (F/M) was 1.3. Arterial hypertension was diagnosed in 27 patients (61.4%), obesity or overweight in 84%, diabetes in 18 patients (40.9%), dyslipidemia in 7 patients (15.9%). Five patients had an extra-adrenal tumor (11.4%). First diagnostic procedure was computed tomography (CT) in 63.6%, abdominal ultrasonography in 31.8% and magnetic resonance imaging in 4.5%. Regarding the location of the masses: 36.4% were in right side, 34.1% were in left side and 29.5% were bilateral. The Cause of radiologic imaging was kidney problems in 50%, liver disorders in 20.4%, epigastralgia in 13.6%, thorax pathology in 6.8%, rheumatologic causes in 6.8% and an inflammatory syndrome in 2.3% of cases. The average diameter of tumors was 26.6±15.9 mm. The mass was single in 65.9%, well limited in 95.5% and homogeneous in 81.8%. Patients with functioning tumors had larger tumor diameters than those with non-functioning tumors (P<0.05). Final diagnosis was: non-functioning adenomas in 68.2%, pheochromocytoma in 6.8%, Cushing’s syndrome in 6.8%, primary aldosteronism in 4.5%, subclinical Cushing’s syndrome associated to phéochromocytoma in 2.3%, hematoma in 2.3%, tuberculosis in 2.3% and metastasis in 6.8%. Patients with functioning tumors had larger tumor diameters than those with non-functioning tumors (P<0.05). Two patients were diagnosed with adrenal insufficiency.

Conclusion: Our study showed that AI occurred more frequently in overweight or obese women with diabetes and hypertension. Its most common diagnostic procedure was CT and etiologies were dominated by nonfunctioning adenomas.