Hormone, Diabetes and Metabolism Terms

A result that reads like a label but works as a prediction, since it forecasts which treatments a tumor is likely to answer.

A lab test to find out if cancer cells have estrogen receptors (proteins to which estrogen will bind).

Hormones given to postmenopausal women or to women who have had their ovaries surgically removed.

A rare inherited condition in which one or more tumors form in the parathyroid glands (four pea-sized organs found on the thyroid) and cause them to make too much parathyroid hormone.

An inherited form of medullary thyroid cancer (cancer that forms in the cells of the thyroid that make the hormone calcitonin).

A rare inherited condition in which one or more tumors form in the parathyroid glands (four pea-sized organs found on the thyroid) and cause them to make too much parathyroid hormone.

Cancer that forms in follicular cells in the thyroid.

A hormone made in the pituitary gland.

A pituitary hormone that tells the ovaries to ripen an egg and the testicles to keep making sperm.

A tumor that is found in endocrine tissue and makes hormones (chemicals that travel in the bloodstream and control the actions of other cells or organs).

A hormone released from special cells in the lining of the stomach after eating.

An indolent (slow-growing) cancer that forms in cells that make hormones in the lining of the gastrointestinal tract (the stomach and intestines).

A gland is an organ built to produce and release substances such as hormones, sweat, or digestive fluid for use elsewhere in the body.

Insulin takes the attention, but the opposing hormone is what keeps blood sugar from falling too far between meals and overnight.

A rare pancreatic tumor that produces a hormone called glucagon.

The process of making glucose (sugar) from its own breakdown products or from the breakdown products of lipids (fats) or proteins.

The brain depends on it almost exclusively and stores none, which is why the body defends the blood level so aggressively.

One molecule doing two unrelated jobs: a disposal tag in the liver and a structural thread in cartilage and joint fluid.

A family of enzymes involved in metabolism and in making toxic compounds less harmful to the body.

A measurement rather than a substance: the word names how much glucose is in the blood, which is why it takes prefixes.