ESPE Abstracts

Background: Final height in patients with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) is generally assumed to be lower than the population norm. Besides CAH subtype and age at diagnosis, timing of pubertal development is considered to have a significant impact on final height. In most CAH patients, puberty starts within normal ranges, although at a somewhat earlier mean age compared to reference populations. CAH-complicating gonadotropin-dependent precocious puberty has been reported...

Background: The disturbance of the GH-IGF-axis in type 1 diabetes (T1DM) with low circulating IGF-I, GH hypersecretion, and hyperinsulinemia, which may be associated with high tissue IGF-I, have implications on long-term vascular complications.Objective and hypotheses: To establish disease, sex and age related serum IGF-I reference values for children with T1DM and test the hypothesis that IGF-I SDS is lower in T1DM than in healthy controls and negativel...

Background: Severe early-onset obesity (SEOO) in children is more frequently observed in subjects with genetic disorders of which those of leptin pathway can be analyzed biochemically and genetically.Objectives: The aim of the study was to investigate anthropometrics and leptin parameters, specifically searching for bio-inactive leptin, in children with SEOO.Methods: Study cohort includes children ...

Classical growth hormone insensitivity (GHI) is caused by a defect of the growth hormone receptor and is characterized by severe postnatal growth failure, craniofacial disproportion, IGF-I deficiency and normal or elevated levels of growth hormone. This is a rare condition. With the development of new genetic techniques during the last two decades other monogenetic defects resulting in milder forms of GHI have been identified. These include genes involved in the GH-IGF-I axis:...

Background: Fatty liver disease in children and adolescents is the most common cause of chronic liver disease in many countries. Criteria for a diagnosis of pediatric metabolic associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD) are based on hepatic steatosis in ultrasound, blood biomarkers or liver biopsy in association with one of the three criteria: excess adiposity (overweight, obesity or abdominal obesity), prediabetes or type 2 diabetes, or evidence of metabolic dysr...

Background: Milk supplementation increases serum IGF-I concentrations in healthy children and the effect is attributed to elevation of insulin and/or direct effects of milk proteins. Low serum IGF-I concentrations are common among children with short stature and may be associated with GH deficiency but poor nutrition/malabsorption may also contribute. Effects of nutritional supplementation on serum IGF-I is poorly studied in short children.Aim: To invest...

Background: The diagnosis of severe primary IGF-I deficiency (IGFD) in children with normal growth hormone (GH) peak in stimulation tests (stimGH) should be confirmed by IGF-I increase <15.0 ng/ml during generation test (IGF-GT), however the significance of IGF-GT has been questioned by some researchers.Objective and hypotheses: Evaluation of the significance of IGF-GT in children with normal stim GH and IGFD, with respect to efficacy of growth-promo...

For decades, the dominant conceptual framework for understanding short and tall stature was centered on the GH-IGF-I axis. However, recent findings in basic molecular and cellular biology and in clinical genetics have uncovered a vast array of other regulatory systems that control skeletal growth and an accompanying vast array of genetic defects outside the GH-IGF-I axis that can cause disorders of linear growth. As a result, the traditional view of short or tall stature that ...

Introduction: Recombinant Growth Hormone (GH) has changed the lives of many patients with Prader-Willi Syndrome (PWS). GH treatment has beneficial effects on body composition, physical performance, cognition, psychomotor development, respiratory function and quality of life of patients with PWS. Due to the narrow therapeutic range, GH treatment is subject to strict limits. Clinicians measure serum immunoreactive Insulin-like Growth Factor 1 ('total IGF-I&#...

Background: Patients affected by pseudohypoparathyroidism type 1b (PHPI-b) develop resistance to PTH leading to hypocalcemia and hyperphosphoremia, which is often associated with resistance to TSH. PHP-Ib is associated with methylation changes at one or several differentially methylated regions (DMRs) within the GNAS complex locus, located at 20q13.2–13.3. This locus gives rise to several different transcripts (NESP55, XL, A/B), with varying patterns of imprinted expressi...