Intro to Endocrine Flashcards
1
Q
Common endocrine diseases managed by the primary care provider?
A
- diabetes mellitus
- thyroid diseases (hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism)
- Hyperlipidemia
2
Q
What is endocrinology?
A
- study of hormones and disorders of these hormones
3
Q
What makes up the endocrine system?
A
- hypothalamus and pituitary
- thyroid and parathyroid
- adrenals
- (islets of langerhans, ovaries, testicles, placenta)
4
Q
Who was the first person to use the term hormone?
A
- Ernest Henry Starling
5
Q
How does the endocrine system maintain homeostasis?
A
- hormones act on distant target cells to maintain the stability of the internal environment
- secretion of the hormone was evoked by a change in the milieu and the resulting action on the target cell restored the milieu to normal. The desired return to the status quo results in the maintenance of homeostasis
6
Q
What are hormones?
A
- any substance normally produced by specialized cells in some part of the body, carried by the blood stream to another part, where it effects the body as a whole
- vehicles for intracellular and extracellular communication
7
Q
What are the functions of hormones?
A
- maintain homeostasis
- regulate growth and development
- promote sexual maturation, sexual rhythms and facilitate reproduction
- regulate energy production
- adapt/adjust body to stressful/emergency situations
- promote/inhibit production or release of other hormones
8
Q
What are the characteristics of hormones?
A
- specificity: only target cells respond
- multiple actions
- varibale half life: often depends on solubility properties
- variable forms: depends on wt
- excretion rates: diurnal variation, cyclic patterns, and stimulus response
9
Q
What are the 2 different functional types of hormones?
A
- tropic: originate from anterior pituitary gland
specific for another endocrine gland - non-tropic or direct effector: secreted by non-pituitary endocrine glands, act directly on peripheral tissue. Exert a feedback effect on hypothalamus or anterior pituitary gland
10
Q
categories of chemical hormones?
A
- peptides/proteins: polypeptides or glycoproteins, soluble in plasma, interact with target cell membrane receptors to trigger a 2nd messenger to complete the specific action of the hormone, short term effects
- Amines: AA derivatives, poorly soluble in plasma, interact with membrane receptors of target cells, provide long and short term effects
- steroids: composed of lipids (cholesterol), can transverse through the cell membrane, produced by ovaries, testis, placenta, and adrenal cortex, insoluble in water, and long-lasting
11
Q
Where are hormone receptors and what are their function?
A
- located on cell membrane or within cell cytoplasm.
- binding of hormone to receptor initiates a signal, results in changes in gene expression, ultimately causes a biological response.
12
Q
How are hormones regulated and controlled?
A
- occurs by controlling rate of synthesis rather than rate of degradation
- primary control: hypothalamus - small gland next to pituitary gland, and is connected to pituitary by “pituitary stalk”
- pituitary gland: releases both tropic and effector hormones
13
Q
Relationship b/t endocrine and nervous system?
A
- 2 major communication systems in the body
- integrate stimuli and responses to changes in external and internal environment
- both are crucial to coordinated functions of highly differentiated cells, tissues, and organs
- unlike the nervous system, the endocrine system is anatomically discontinuous.
14
Q
Functions of the nervous system?
A
- exerts point-to-point control through nerves, similar to sending messages by conventional landline telephone. Nervous control is electrical in nature and immediate
15
Q
Endocrine system functions?
A
- broadcasts its hormonal messages to essentially all cells by secretion into blood and extracellular fluid. Like a radio broadcast, it requires a receiver to get the message, in the case of endocrine messages, cells must bear a receptor for the hormone being broadcast in order to respond.
16
Q
Why are cells targets for hormones?
A
- becausae it has a specific receptor for the hormone
- most hormones circulate in blood, coming into contact with essentially all cells. However, a given hormone usually affects only a limited number of cells, which are called target cells, a target cell responds to a hormoned because it bears receptors for the hormone
17
Q
What 2 systems are needed for proper body regulation and function?
A
- Nervous system and Endocrine system
18
Q
Breakdown of Nervous system?
A
- PNS: Efferent and Afferent, efferent: Autonomic (parasympathetic and sympathetic) , and somatic
- CNS
19
Q
Are the 2 main systems (endocrine and nervous system) that coordinate and regulate function mutually exclusive?
A
- NO!
- one example of 2 systems working together: sympathetic flight or fight response - direct stimulation of effector site by neuron -> stimulation of medulla results in release of epi and norepi in the blood which: greatly prolongs sympathetic stimulation, and this can affect all cells of the body, even those not innervated directly by sympathetic neurons
20
Q
2 major regulatory systems of the body?
A
- endocrine and nervous system
- ** Because there is so much overlap with coordination of function with the nervous system, there are several sxs of endocrine disorders that mimic pathology seen in other organ systems
21
Q
What does the endocrine system do?
A
- controls numerous body processes: growth and development metabolism reproduction homeostasis - involves numerous organs and tissues located throughout the body, and it works in conjunction with the nervous system (and to lesser extent with the immune system)
22
Q
endocrine system?
A
- produces chemical messengers (hormones) that influence growth, development, and metabolic activities. There are 2 major categories of glands in the body: exocrine and endocrine
