The Pituitary World News Podcast

Today's podcast covers my conversation with Jill Sisco, president of the Acromegaly Community, about the recent meetings with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the US governmental entity responsible for approving new medications. Our conversation focuses on the original meeting held in 2021 and a recent listening session where the AC provided additional feedback to the FDA. These meetings help ensure the FDA considers patient's experiences, needs, and expectations as they provide drug development guidance to pharmaceutical companies. You can read the original report here. Jill also briefly mentioned during our chat the "Faces of Hope" initiative they undertook a few years ago. Here's a link to that photographic essay. Worth a look!

On today's podcast and Cushing's awareness day and month, we bring you a few excerpts from our soon-to-be-released new book on Cushing's. The book's author and Pituitary World News cofounder, Dr. Lewis Blevins, reads from a few selected chapters to give insight into the book's content. We are delighted to present these excerpts to join the many organizations, patients, and healthcare professionals in recognizing Cushing's disease awareness month and day. The book is well underway, with over 37 chapters on the editor's and publisher's desk. The book's release date will be announced shortly. Stay tuned for more information about this exciting project from Pituitary World News. You can read more about the book in this article.

Today’s podcast is about our super athlete friend Risa August and her new book, “The Road Unpaved.” We first met Risa in 2019 when she came to the Pituitary World News/UCSF patient gathering. We chatted about her experience and and her plans to ride her bike from Canada to Mexico. We followed her herculean effort to ride 1845-plus miles to get from Canada to Mexico on the Pacific Coast Highway, which, as you can imagine, is no picnic for anyone, let alone if you are fighting acromegaly symptoms. It is downright amazing she did it at all. Now, she has written a book about her experience with acromegaly, the ride, and life. Learn more about Risa, her practice, her upcoming plans at Risa Unleashed, read her PWN articles search for Risa or Marisa here, or go to – www.risaaugust.com

The Spanish Endocrine Conference was organized late last year by the "Sociedad Española de Endocrinologia y Nutricion (SEEN). SEEN offers an excellent resource for information to the Spanish-speaking world. Spain and Spanish-speaking countries have been our focus as we seek to develop more content in Spanish for our edition of Pituitary Word New in Español. Today's podcasts covers part of the conference and shares my conversations with three world-renowned Spanish endocrinologists. Don't miss my chat with Dr. Elena Valassi on how Cushing's and acromegaly affect bones and muscles. Dr. Manel Puig Domingo talks about his views on the new nomenclature or terminology between adenomas and neuroendocrine tumors (PitNets), a thorny issues we've been covering from all angles. He also gives us an update on his projects on facial recognition in acromegaly; a fascinating subject since it could have a considerable impact on the early diagnosis of acromegaly. Lastly, I chatted with my good friend Dr. Javier Salvador, who recently retired from clinical work after almost 50 years as one of Spain's leading endocrinologists and professors at the University of Navarra. We chatted about endocrine education, awareness, technology, early diagnosis, and his new assignment teaching medical ethics. I hope this podcast will give you a new perspective from these leading researchers and physicians tackling these challenging diseases.

In today's podcast, we talk with Giacomo Chiesi, Head of Global Rare Diseases at the Chiesi Group, where he leads a team in developing and marketing treatments for rare and ultra-rare diseases. Chiesi, headquartered in Parma, Italy, is a family-owned enterprise in an industry not known for many family businesses. Chiesi entered the acromegaly space when the company recently acquired Ireland-based Amryt Pharma, which marketed the acromegaly oral drug MYCAPSSA. As you will hear, Chiesi is a fascinating company with a rich history. It is not only dedicated to rare diseases but also has an unrelenting focus on forward-thinking business practices. We talked at length about their initiatives and position on social responsibility, patient centricity, patient care, and environmentally sustainable practices. Learn more about Chiesi, their plans, and current patient support initiatives like Chiesi Total Care. We are truly delighted to bring you this podcast.

Today's' podcast is a recording of the Pituitary World News talk program that aired live on November 16. The information comes directly from one of the busiest, most successful clinics in the world of pituitary disease. The podcast presents a real-world, honest, in-depth discussion of health insurance denials, how this practice affects patients and physicians, how they use guidelines to muddy the process, oppose individualized care, and question a specialist's decision-making. Although most denials are successfully resolved, they undoubtedly increase costs and produce immeasurable anxiety, often leaving patients with no other choice than to get legal help or take medications that may not be what their specialist physicians prescribe. Insurance denials are real issues facing patients today and are central to a health system that desperately needs a major overhaul. Please listen and share your thoughts.

In today's podcast, Veronica, an MBA graduate of Notre Dame University and law school student, tells us about her experience with a prolactinoma. What is interesting about this story is that in pituitary medicine, where delays in diagnosis and general unawareness are all too often the order of the day, this is a perfect example of how awareness and smart thinking make things work as they are supposed to. The patient is aware and digs for information, primary care docs are aware, involved, and immediately tuned in to a possible diagnosis, and the patient gets to the specialist for prompt treatment. We want to see more stories like Veronica's!

Podcast and Video: In today's podcast and accompanying video of this MRI, Dr. Blevins discusses and illustrates a case of a patient with a double pituitary adenoma. He also talks about the types of adenomas that can produce several hormones. Listen to Dr. Blevins as he discusses this case and shows us a video of the MRI. This MRI video illustrates the double pituitary adenomas discussed in the podcasts. Watch it here!

Today, Dr. Scott Struthers talks to PWN about paltusotine, their new once-a-day acromegaly oral drug candidate. Crinetics recently published results from the latest phase of the paltusotine clinical trial. He discussed the results and provided a fascinating look at the details and their learning from the data as they analyzed these initial results. He also shared the status of a new drug for Cushing's and Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH), currently entering phase 2 of a clinical trial. Don't miss it! For those following PWN, you may recall we recorded our first podcasts with Dr. Struthers when paltusotine entered its clinical trial in 2017. If you haven't heard it, I highly recommend it. It is really interesting to hear Dr. Struthers talk about their work on drugs for acromegaly and other neuroendocrine disorders and how the company has progressed since those early days. Also, if you'd like to learn more, listen to our podcast series on new drug development, "The Journey to a New Drug."

Today, I am particularly thrilled about this podcast with a group of leading professional nurses who are educators, scientists, researchers, nurse practitioners, and graduate students. Their work is critical to pituitary patients' care and quality of life. It affects how endocrine nurses practice and how they are trained, what they learn, and how they do their jobs. In this podcast, you will hear their opinions about the opportunities and challenges, the issues they face in ensuring enough well-trained endocrine nurses enter the profession to satisfy the demands, and their views on the future. I want to thank these extremely busy pros for taking the time to chat with me and for their tremendous work for us all. Enjoy!

Listen to this podcast and learn more about this new groundbreaking educational program exclusively produced by Pituitary World News. And later this week, don't miss the first episode of this exciting initiative. Stay tuned!

In this brief podcast, Dr. Blevins relates a fascinating Cushings case to talk about the importance of understanding disease patterns and how depth of knowledge gives physicians the critical skills to recognize unusual conditions.

Noncompliance with required Doctor follow-up visits and properly taking medications is a serious issue. Dr. Blevins tackles this problem with real clinical examples in this brief podcast.

Listen to this informative podcast with Ren Renwick, CEO of the Pituitary Foundation in the United Kindom. The foundation is a leading volunteer organization providing a variety of resources and support functions for people with pituitary disease. These include helplines with nurses and patients where people can ask medical and practical questions and a variety of helpful resources for patients' physical and emotional well-being. Ren shares some of the foundation's best practices in the podcast and highlights their critical services. The Pituitary Foundation UK is undoubtedly one of the most effective organizations helping people affected by pituitary disease today. Don't miss this informative discussion. For more information, visit the UK Pituitary Foundation's website here

Continuing our recent coverage of brain fog, Dr. Blevins and I discussed a few examples from his clinical practice and personal experiences with the condition. We also cover a fascinating case from his clinic about a patient with an empty sella incidental finding and residual disease. We covered a lot of ground and interesting subjects in this session you don't want to miss, including how medicine and medical care have changed, the need for more pituitary centers of excellence, and how working on Pituitary World News has affected how we look at things. Please join us!

With today's podcasts from this week's live-talk show, Dr. Blevins recaps our content dedicated to Global Cushing's month with a talk about two fascinating recent Cushing cases from his practice. He also touches on some very interesting caveats about thyroid hormone replacement. Then, after a surprise musical interlude (you'll have to listen to find out), we discuss the current social media challenges and look at what's coming to Pituitary World News. Don't miss the discussion, and don't forget to subscribe here so you can receive notifications whenever we publish a new article or a podcast.

Listen to this fascinating discussion of adrenal Cushing's or hypercortisolism as Dr. Lewis Blevins walks us through the disease's characteristics, biochemistry, and treatment options. In the talk, he focuses on different conditions, including adrenal adenomas, adrenal cancer, adrenal hyperplasia, and other related diseases like Carney Complex and McCune-Albright syndrome. Dr. Blevins also focuses on other situations where unrelated reasons lead to discovering adrenal adenomas or mild adrenal hyperplasia, resulting in pathological cortisol secretion. Finally, he closes the discussion with two recent cases from his practice that illustrate the issues related to these conditions.

Today's program focuses on interactions between the medical and psychological worlds. Join Dr. Blevins and me as we welcome PWN contributor, marriage and family therapist, and author Linda Rio for a fascinating discussion on how pituitary disease, or any chronic disease, manifests itself mentally and emotionally. Listen as we muse on how emotional health and psychological distress can affect people's daily lives and how they deal with their disorders. Our talk covers other interesting issues, including how the medical and psychological world intersect, doctor-patient interactions and expectations, the influence of social media, and dr. Google, and the sorry state of some people's interactions and behaviors.

Meet Laura Cheng. Laura is a nurse. She has acromegaly. She works as a clinical nurse and is currently enrolled in the endocrine certificate program and pursuing a Master's Degree in nursing at Duke University. Laura's connection to this disease gives her a unique perspective and will provide an invaluable resource to her patients. We caught up with Laura a few weeks ago. This is her story.

This week's Live-talk offers critical knowledge that people affected with pituitary and endocrine diseases need to know to ensure they receive proper treatment. Dr. Sylvia Asa, a pioneer in endocrine and pituitary tumor pathology, talks with Dr. Lewis Blevins about her work in the field and the reclassification of pituitary adenomas to Pituitary Neuroendocrine Tumors, or PitNets, which she recently led. This is crucial knowledge you don't want to miss! And please stay tuned for a downloadable document with the essential questions to ask about the pathology of your tumor to ensure your physician has the pertinent information for your treatment.