Pharmacotherapy: Puberty induction in Turner syndrome.

摘要

Use of the anabolic steroid oxandrolone from 9 years of age could be a safe and effective alternative to late pubertal induction with estrogen to improve final height in girls with Turner syndrome treated with growth hormone.Growth hormone injections improve final height in girls with Turner syndrome, but whether adjunctive treatment with oral oxandrolone and/or late puberty induction-which extends the time until the epiphyses fuse-improve final height further is controversial.Gault et al. randomly allocated 92 girls with Turner syndrome treated with growth hormone (one daily injection of 10 mg/m2 per week) at the age of 9 years (or at the time of recruitment if they were >9 years old) to either active oxandrolone (0.05mg/kg daily, but never more than 2.5 mg) or placebo. In a second randomization, girls were allocated to 2 ug ethinylestradiol when aged 12 years or 14 years, in which case they received placebo for 2 years before puberty induction.