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Low growth hormone and idiopathic short Stature.

Posted by hilsa22 @hilsa22, 19 hours ago

My Son was diagnosed with idiopathic short stature, he is 15 and 4 feet 11 inches. His bone age is 13 years. He was also tested for Igf-1 which was 176. He is in Tanner stage 2. Also, he has significant food allergies( milk, wheat, egg, seafood).
Both my husband and I are 5 feet 8 inches. My question is, should we go forward with igf-1 treatment or wait little longer to see if nature takes its course??. Constitutional growth delay runs in my family, my brother grew mostly after going to college.
I am in two minds about going with growth hormone, but son doesn’t want to be the short one anymore in his high school. Please help

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Mentor
Sue, Volunteer Mentor | @sueinmn | 16 hours ago

@hilsa22 I understand your concern - my sister faced it with her son (now 41) and chose to treat with growth hormone at age 15. He finally reached 5'7", compared to his brothers without the syndrome, who reached 5'6" and 5'10". My daughter will eventually have the same decision to make with her 9 year old. At this point, they are leaning towards no treatment - his Dad continued to grow until age 21 or 22.

If your son has expressed his desire for treatment, have you and/or his doctors shared the risks and advantages?

REPLY
hilsa22 | @hilsa22 | 14 hours ago

Thanks for replying. We have discussed the long term risk with my son. Who feels it is not only affecting his social life but his eventual college chances.
He is very good athlete and without height and weight gain, he feels he has no chance running cross country or track in college.

Since you have family member who have used growth hormone, has it effected their well being in anyway??

REPLY
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Mentor
Sue, Volunteer Mentor | @sueinmn | 11 hours ago
In reply to @hilsa22 "Thanks for replying. We have discussed the long term risk with my son. Who feels it..." + (show)
@hilsa22

Thanks for replying. We have discussed the long term risk with my son. Who feels it is not only affecting his social life but his eventual college chances.
He is very good athlete and without height and weight gain, he feels he has no chance running cross country or track in college.

Since you have family member who have used growth hormone, has it effected their well being in anyway??

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It doesn't seem to have affected him, although he does have some heat intolerancedoctors are divided over whether the growth hormones could have contributed.

By the way, let your son know that in high school our 3 top metro cross country runners were all under 5'4" and 120 pounds. I ran practice with our HS boys' team because there was no cross country for girls back in the 60's.

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