Octreotide: effective treatment for hyperparathyroidism? A prospective, randomized, controlled clinical trial.

BACKGROUND

Recent studies suggest a role for somatostatin in the medical treatment of hyperparathyroidism. In a prospective, randomized, controlled, triple blinded clinical trial in patients with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism, we evaluated the response of biochemical parameters relevant in hyperparathyroidism to the somatostatin analog octreotide.

METHODS

Forty patients each with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism were studied. Among other parameters, serum calcium and serum phosphate, parathyroid hormone, calcitonin, osteocalcin, and octreotide were assessed before and repeatedly for 4 hours after a single intravenous application of 200 micrograms octreotide or placebo. Subsequent to operation, which was performed on all patients, somatostatin-receptor autoradiography of parathyroid tissue was performed.

RESULTS

After administration of octreotide, which resulted in an increase of plasma levels to pharmacologic levels, no significant changes in any of the biochemical parameters investigated for were observed. Multivariate analysis did not identify patient subpopulations that responded to either drug or placebo (p > 0.05). Forty-five percent of patients receiving octreotide reported side effects: Parathyroid tissue samples of patients with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism were negative for somatostatin-receptor expression.

CONCLUSIONS

Octreotide has no discernible effect on biochemical parameters of patients with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism. Absence of somatostatin receptors, together with lack of octreotide effects, suggests that somatostatin is not effective in the medical therapy of hyperparathyroidism.