Changing pattern of gonadotropins in a patient with an adrenal‐androgen secreting tumor

There are a few studies about the secretion of gonadotropins in women. Acute testosterone infusion to normal women with and without testolactone inhibits LH sssecretion in a dose-dependent manner, without no effect on FSH secretion, while short-term administration of testosterone to normal women and eugonadal female-to-male transsexuals did not alter either gonadotropin levels, or affect the pulsatile secretion of LH. Regarding the effect of chronic hyperandrogenemia, in polycystic ovary syndrome a specific pattern of gonadotropins secretion has been described, with an increased concentration of basal LH and diminished FSH and with an increase in the frequency of LH pulses, while in adrenal or ovarian androgen-secreting tumors, gonadotropin levels vary from high, normal for age or suppressed. The reason for the different gonadotropins pattern in androgen-secreting tumors is not clear. It is possible that the level of testosterone and the time exposure could influence the secretion of gonadotropins, as postulated by Spinder et al in transsexual and Bachelot et al in virilizing ovarian tumors. We report one patient with an adrenal androgen-secreting tumor (adrenal adenoma), where we document for the first time the transition of gonadotropin levels from normal to a suppressed state.