The size of the community rather than its geographical location better defines the risk of iodine deficiency: Results of an extensive survey in Southern Italy

Abstract

The results of the present survey indicate that: 1) in Southern Italy mild to moderate iodine deficiency is still present; 2) median UIE in non urban areas is lower than in urban areas and is related to the size of the community rather than to its geographical location, being higher in a larger community. This may be due to better diversification of dietary habits and the easier availability of iodized salt and processed food through commercial facilities, more common in larger communities. Future monitoring surveys should take into account these observations.

Iodine nutrition in elementary state schools of Queretaro, Mexico: correlations between urinary iodine concentration with global nutrition status and social gap index

“…However, we did not find a significant association for the altitude on UIC, which is in accordance to the results obtained by Aghini-Lombardi and cols. in a study performed in the south of Italy (31). This apparent discrepancy could be related to the improvement, in recent decades, of the public infrastructure, including road construction and commercial trading, which increases the availability of processed food in remote areas.…”

Iodine, Thyroid Autoimmunity and Cancer

“…In old Chinese medical writings of 3600 B.C., a decrease in goiter size was reported upon ingestion of seaweed and overcooked sea sponge [4]. A large number of studies have shown the effect of iodine supplementation on the epidemiology of goiter [5,6,7]. In two surveys conducted in Pescopagano [8,9], an Italian village with a previous moderate iodine deficiency, before and after the introduction of a iodine prophylaxis program on a voluntary basis, a significant reduction of the prevalence of goiter was observed, mainly due to the reduction of diffuse goiter in 2010 compared to the previous survey of 1995 (10.3 vs. 34.0%).…”

Effects of GH replacement therapy on thyroid volume and nodule development in GH deficient adults: a retrospective cohort study

“…This might be related to the different severity of iodine deficiency in the geographic areas of origin. In fact, such prevalence is not different from that reported in the healthy Italian population in other studies carried out during the same period of time (26). Moreover, 17 patients were affected by AO-GHD and in most of them the nodular goiter was diagnosed before onset of GHD (and of TSH deficit, when present), indicating that the thyroid gland was presumably still exposed to normal levels of GH/IGF1 and TSH, when nodular growth occurred.…”

“…All patients were from areas of mild-to-moderate iodine deficiency in Southern Italy (North-Eastern Sicily). In this area, the estimated frequency of thyroid nodules in the general population is about 13%, ranging from 4% up to 28% in an age-dependent manner (26). For this reason, we routinely perform a thyroid ultrasonography (US) in the setting of endocrine evaluation of patients referred to our Outpatient Clinic.…”