Precocious pubarche, dyslipidemia, and low IGF binding protein-1 in girls:: Relation to reduced prenatal growth

An increasing series of pediatric endocrinopathies and metabolic anomalies has been recognized as related to reduced prenatal growth. We have tested whether the association of precocious pubarche (PP), dyslipidemia, and low serum IGF binding protein-1 in girls is also related to reduced prenatal growth. Fasting serum lipids, lipoproteins, and IGFBP-1 concentrations were measured in 187,girls (83 without PP and 104 with PP; mean age, 11.8 y; range, 5-18 y) with known birthweight and gestational age, the latter being transformed into birthweight SD scores. Birthweight SD scores of girls with PP were lower than those of girls without PP. Within the group of PP girls, those with dyslipidemia and low IGFBP-1 had lower (p < 0.0001) birth-weight SD scores (-2.02 +/- 0.23; mean +/- SEM) than those with normal lipids, lipoproteins, and IGFBP-1 (-0.37 +/- 0.15), whereas girls with an intermediate number of abnormalities had intermediate birthweight SD scores (-0.80 +/- 0.18). In conclusion, dyslipidemia and low serum IGFBP-1 in girls with PP were found to be related to reduced prenatal growth, an observation pointing to the prenatal origin of these metabolic abnormalities.