Publications by authors named "Jessica G Van Der Gugten"

Background: Aldosterone measurement is critical for diagnosis of primary aldosteronism and disorders of the renin-angiotensin system. We developed an LC-MS/MS method for plasma and urinary aldosterone and compared it to our RIA method. We present a reference interval study for a Belgian population.

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Glucocorticoids (GCs) are circulating adrenal steroid hormones that coordinate physiology, especially the counter-regulatory response to stressors. While systemic GCs are often considered immunosuppressive, GCs in the thymus play a critical role in antigen-specific immunity by ensuring the selection of competent T cells. Elevated thymus-specific GC levels are thought to occur by local synthesis, but the mechanism of such tissue-specific GC production remains unknown.

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Glucocorticoids (GCs) are produced by the adrenal glands and circulate in the blood to coordinate organismal physiology. In addition, different tissues may independently regulate their local GC levels via local GC synthesis. Here, we find that in the mouse, endogenous GCs show tissue-specific developmental patterns, rather than mirroring GCs in the blood.

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Plasma renin activity (PRA) is an essential analytical tool for screening and diagnosis of secondary forms of hypertension. Typically, PRA is measured by competitive radioimmunoassay, but there are significant drawbacks to this technique including non-specificity, long analysis times, narrow calibration range, and the requirement for radionucleotides. In this paper, we report a method for plasma renin activity determination by immuno-MALDI mass spectrometry detection.

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Background: To evaluate the accuracy and precision of a method for serum aldosterone using supported liquid extraction (SLE) for sample preparation instead of the more conventional liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) approach.

Methods: Two independently developed SLE-based LC-MS/MS methods for serum aldosterone (sample volumes 250 μl and 300 μl respectively) were compared to a modification of a previously reported LLE approach (sample volume 500 μl) in two method comparisons (n=75 and n=97). SLE analyses were performed at two separate centres.

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Aims: Accurate serum aldosterone determination is critical to the screening and diagnosis of primary aldosteronism, the localisation of aldosterone producing tumours, and the investigation of other disorders of the renin-angiotensin system. Mass spectrometry offers a means to overcome problems with method-dependent bias between competitive immunoassays for aldosterone. The authors have developed a simple, sensitive and precise liquid-liquid extraction aldosterone method for the ABSCIEX API-5000 liquid chromatography and tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) system.

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