Thyroid hormone deficiency suppresses fetal pituitary-adrenal function near term: implications for the control of fetal maturation and parturition.

Conclusions Thyroid hormones are important regulators of the structure and secretory capacity of the pituitary-adrenal axis before birth. In hypothyroid fetuses, low plasma cortisol may be due to impaired adrenocortical growth and steroidogenic enzyme expression, secondary to low circulating ACTH concentration. Greater corticotroph population in the anterior pituitary gland of the hypothyroid fetus indicates compensatory cell proliferation and that there may be abnormal corticotroph capacity for ACTH synthesis and/or impaired hypothalamic input. Suppression of the development of the fetal HPA axis by thyroid hormone deficiency may contribute to the delay in fetal maturation and delivery observed in hypothyroid offspring. PMID: 33126831 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Thyroid : official journal of the American Thyroid Association - Category: Endocrinology Tags: Thyroid Source Type: research