ESPE Abstracts

Background: Unlike precocious puberty, early and/or fast puberty have been less studied, despite the fact that this disorder may be associated to an organic lesion at CNS level.Objective and hypotheses: We illustrate a case of early and fast puberty in a girl with an occult intra-cranial tumor.Method: The girl was the first child of non-consanguineous, Italian parents. The family had a positive history of early puberty. Target heig...

Objective and hypotheses: We studied the prevalence of deficiency in the short stature homeobox containing gene (SHOX) in short-statured children and analysed clinical and radiological signs.Method: A total of 162 children aged 1–17 years (53% females, 67% prepubertal, median age 6.6 years, median height SDS −1.7) presenting with short stature between 2008 and 2014, were analysed for SHOX mutations by direct sequencing and multiplex ligation p...

Background: The correct diagnosis of growth hormone deficiency (GHD) and the definition of growth response in the management of growth hormone (GH)-treated children is controversial.Objective and hypotheses: To evaluate: i) short-term and long-term efficacy of GH treatment; ii) various criteria commonly used to define poor response to GH therapy and compare them in the same cohort of GHD patients.Method: Our study includes 94 child...

Background: Short stature may represent a significant psychosocial problem. The rationale for GH treatment has traditionally rested upon the clinical improvement in terms of growth and well-being. Great importance is also associated with the adherence to the therapy.Objective and hypotheses: We have investigated the benefits obtained by GH treatment, the factors that positively influence growth, the differences between ‘objective’ and ‘sub...

Background: Congenital hypothyroidism (CH) is a heterogeneous disorder. While the great majority of cases are considered sporadic, the use of next generation sequencing (NGS) may bring significant advances in elucidating the underlying molecular mechanisms.Case presentation: We selected a family with three children affected by CH with gland in situ and diagnosed at neonatal screening: the index patient, his sister and his brother. Data at diagno...

Short stature is a common clinical presentation in children. New genetics approache such as “Next Generation Sequencing” have recently reported many monogenic defects in genes related to the growth plate cartilage and in GH-IGF-1 axis. The purpose of this study was to analyze a cohort of 64 patients (31 females and 33 males) affected by ISS. The patiens have been subjected to genetic investigations by performing an NGS panel of genes involved in growth, the evaluat...

Introduction: Short stature is one of the main reasons leading a patient to the attention of the Pediatric Endocrinologist. It is important to know the possible causes of short stature, even the rarest genetic mutations associated with short stature. Although the diagnosis of short stature is primarily the result of physical examination with anthropometric measurements, biochemical and radiological data, genetical tests currently play an important role.<p ...

Obesity is increasing, and the related complications are well known. Clinical Trials related with specific diets are currently lacking in paediatrics. There is an increasing interest in Mediterranean diet (MD). The Med4Youth European study* has enrolled 240, 13- to 16-year-old subjects with a BMI above the 90th percentile(WHO curves) in a multicenter randomized controlled trial (Italy, Spain and Portugal) to evaluate the effects of MD. We present the data relative to the 80 su...

V.C. was referred to our Centre for short stature. The mid-parental target height was 153 cm (-1,6 SDS). Her mother had one spontaneous abortion and displayed mild short stature (151,5 cm). Her father had Arnold Chiari syndrome type 1 and was 165,9 cm tall. V.C. was delivered at term after in-vitro-fertilization pregnancy with intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR) from gestational week 21. Birth weight was 2160 g (SGA, SDS -3,17); length was 45 cm (SDS -2,92); head circumfere...

CHOPS syndrome is a rare monogenic disorder caused by heterozygous gain-of-function variants in AFF4. The 13 patients reported to date share a highly recognizable phenotype: Coarse face, Cognitive impairment, Heart defects, Obesity, Pulmonary involvement, Short stature and Skeletal dysplasia. AFF4 encodes a scaffold protein involved in transcriptional elongation and critical for gene expression regulation during embryogenesis. Notably, it appears to regulate adipogenic differe...