Gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonist treatment of girls with constitutional short stature and normal pubertal development

GnRH agonists have been proposed to improve final height in patients with constitutional short stature. We treated 31 girls, aged 11.9 +/- 1 yr (mean +/- SD), with short stature, recent pubertal onset and predicted final height of 155 cm or less with depot triptorelin. During the 23 +/- 4 months of treatment, bone age progression was 0.6 +/- 0.3 bone age yr/yr, and growth velocity declined from 7 +/- 2 to 4 +/- 0.8 cm/yr (P < 0.0001). Height prognosis, calculated by the Bayley-Pinneau method, progressed from 149.6 +/- 3.4 to 151.8 +/- 4 cm at the end of treatment (+2.2 +/- 2.6 cm; P < 0.0001). When treatment was interrupted, growth velocity slightly increased to 4.6 +/- 1.6 cm/yr, and bone age maturation was accelerated: 1.3 +/- 0.4 bone age yr/yr during the first posttreatment year. At the last visit, 26 +/- 9 months after interruption of treatment, bone age was 14.9 +/- 1.3 yr (greater than or equal to 13.5 yr in all patients), height was 149.1 +/- 4 cm, and anal height prognosis was 150.6 +/- 3.6 cm. Final height prognosis was 1 +/- 2.3 cm greater than pretreatment height prognosis (P < 0.02) and 1.2 +/- 2.2 cm below the height predicted at the end of the treatment (P < 0.01). No major side-effect was observed. Height SD score decreased during treatment with GnRH agonist from -2.3 +/- 0.9 to -2.7 +/- 0.7 sn score (P < 0.0001). We conclude that 2 yr of depot triptorelin-induced pubertal delay has a limited effect on near-final height in girls with constitutional short stature and that the growth benefit observed does not currently justify the use of GnRH agonists, given their cost and potential side-effects.