Which children with idiopathic short stature should receive growth hormone therapy?

摘要

To answer this question is a difficult task梩he parameters necessary for precise evaluation of children with idiopathic short stature (ISS) are not yet clearly established. Before proposing which children with ISS should receive growth hormone (GH) therapy, therefore, I will discuss the possible etiology of ISS, and the efficacy and safety of the proposed treatment regimen.Defining ISS is apparently simple: this definition includes a group of children who are short for unknown reasons. One must consider, however, that only a subset of children with ISS will be bona fide patients. Some children are short simply because their parents are short (i.e. hereditary or familial short stature).