Premium
GROWTH HORMONE TREATMENT IN CHILDREN WITH CRANIOPHARYNGIOMA: FINAL GROWTH STATUS
Author(s) -
BURNS E. C.,
TANNER J. M.,
PREECE M. A.,
CAMERON N.
Publication year - 1981
Publication title -
clinical endocrinology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.055
H-Index - 147
eISSN - 1365-2265
pISSN - 0300-0664
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2265.1981.tb02969.x
Subject(s) - growth spurt , medicine , testosterone (patch) , endocrinology , craniopharyngioma , bone age , population , growth hormone , hormone , environmental health
SUMMARY Twenty‐seven out of thirty craniopharyngioma patients treated with human growth hormone (hGH) for 2 years or more (average 4·5 years) reached final adult heights above the population third centile, though none was above the fiftieth centile. However, only twelve of twenty‐eight patients had final heights above the lower limits to be expected from their parents' heights. All patients eventually had long legs relative to sitting height (final mean subischial leg length SDS =+ 0·2, final mean sitting height SDS = ‐3·0). Twenty‐nine patients were TSH‐deficient, twenty‐two were ACTH‐deficient, thirteen were deficient in ADH and all had total (85%) or partial (15%) gonado‐trophin deficiency. Following the administration of testosterone or hCG the boys had, on average, only half the normal adolescent growth spurt. This may have been due to the lateness of starting androgens in these patients and we recommend, when considering height, that testosterone or hCG should be started when a bone age of 13·0 ‘years’ is reached or when a lower bone age has remained unchanged for a year. The girls showed no adolescent height spurt; the average increase after oestrogen treatment commenced was 1·7 cm.