Endocrinology and Systemic Diseases

This work offers a comprehensive reference guide to help clinicians in the field of Internal Medicine addressing common aspects of endocrinological disorders in their daily practice. The exponential growth in our knowledge of biomedicine calls for continuous multidisciplinary approaches across specialists and disciplines. In this volume, recognized experts in each given area explore the complex mechanisms linking endocrinological disorders to abnormalities of the cardiovascular system, kidney, liver and gastrointestinal tract, autoimmune, neuro-psychiatric, rheumatic, and dermatologic diseases. Aspects connected to critically ill and elderly patients are examined as well, helping to enhance daily interactions with the most fragile populations observed in clinical medicine.

The individual chapters are designed to deliver timely information while explaining pathophysiological mechanisms with the help of figures, flow-charts, and updated guidelines. The book offers a unique and valuable resource for all clinicians, residents, specialists, and physicians involved daily in the management of complex and multidisciplinary systemic diseases.

Prof. Piero Portincasa (M.D., Ph.D. [Utrecht], dr. H. Causa) is Full Professor of Internal Medicine and Chief of the Academic Division of Internal Medicine "A. Murri," Department of Biomedical Sciences and Human Oncology at the University "Aldo Moro" Medical School and of the Unit of Internal Medicine "A. Pende," Regional Hospital Policlinico in Bari, Italy. He is director of the 4-year residency program in geriatrics. The activities as internist, teacher, and scientist combine both basic and clinical research in the field of dyslipidaemia and metabolic disorders, liver steatosis and gallstone disease, and rare autoinflammatory diseases (Familial Mediterranean Fever). His teaching and research group deals with aspects of food digestion and intolerances, gastrointestinal motility, and application of standard and novel diagnostic tests in gastrointestinal and liver diseases. He is author of more than 500 international papers and several books and chapters.

Prof. Gema Fruhbeck (RNutr, M.D., Ph.D.) combines everyday work in the clinical setting as Director of the Obesity Area and Senior Consultant in the Department of Endocrinology and Nutrition at the Clinica Universidad de Navarra (Pamplona, Spain) with basic research as Head of the Metabolic Research Laboratory at the University of Navarra and Project Leader of CIBEROBN (Centre of Excellence Network in Obesity and Nutrition of the Spanish Institute of Health). Her group has taken the step forward of routinely using body composition measurements in the clinical assessment of patients in order to analyze the relevance of body fat - beyond body mass index - in comorbidity development. In 1997, she worked as Postdoctoral Fellow of the Royal Society in Prof. Andrew Prentice's Energy Group at the MRC Dunn Clinical Nutrition Centre in Cambridge, UK. In 2009, she was unanimously voted President-Elect of the European Association for the Study of Obesity. Prof. Fruhbeck is also a recipient of the Nutrition Society's Silver Medal, UK (2000), "Sir David Cuthbertson Medal" (2005), Lilly Distinguished Career Award in Endocrinology and Nutrition (2011), and Albert Struyvenberg Medal (2013). From 2012 to 2015 Prof. Fruhbeck served as President of the European Association for the Study of Obesity. She has also served as Councillor of the European Society for Clinical Investigation (2014-2018).

Hendrik M. Nathoe was born in Surinam, South America, and moved to the Netherlands in 1983. He studied medicine at the Erasmus Medical Center Rotterdam and graduated summa cum laude in 1991. Prof. Nathoe received his Ph.D. degree in 2004 from the University of Utrecht under supervision of Prof. Diederick Grobbee and Prof. Peter de Jaegere His thesis was entitled Coronary revascularization: Stentimplantation, on-pump or off-pump bypass surgery. After his training he was appointed in 2006 at the University Medical Center Utrecht as General Cardiologist and Associate Professor of Cardiology. Since 2018, he has been Medical Head of the Center for Cardiovascular Disease, the care facility of the UMC Utrecht research focus "Circulatory Health". Here, he collaborates with other vascular specialists to optimize the care of multidisciplinary vascular patients. In 2019, this center was accredited as one of the first in Europe by the European Society of Cardiology for primary and secondary prevention and sports medicine. Since 2020, he has been appointed as Medical Head of the outpatient clinic in the Department of Cardiology at UMC Utrecht. Prof. Nathoe was involved in the governance of the European Society for Clinical Investigation (ESCI) since 2013 as Secretary Treasurer and President. He organized the annual scientific meeting of ESCI in 2014 in Utrecht. He (co)-authored 125 peer-reviewed articles of whom one as first author in the New England Journal of Medicine. He supervised 6 Ph.D. students.
He is member of many steering committees such as SMART study, CHASE investigators, Octopus study, BEACON trial, DECS study, and MARC study. Prof. Nathoe was involved in the 2019 European Society of Cardiology guidelines on "the management of chronic coronary syndromes."
Since 2020, he is Editor-in-Chief of the European Journal of Clinical Investigation.