All issues > Volume 52(9); 2009

Original Article

Korean J Pediatr. 2009;52(9):984-990. Published online September 15, 2009.

Catch up growth in children born small for gestational age by corrected growth curve

Myung Ki MK Jung¹, Ji Eun JE Song¹, Seung S Yang¹, Il Tae IT Hwang¹, Hae Ran HR Lee¹

¹Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, Hallym University, Seoul, Korea

Correspondence Seung S Yang ,Email: drsyang@hallym.or.kr

Abstract

Purpose
Being small for gestational age (SGA) is a risk factor of short stature in children. Genetic background such as mid-parental height (MPH) is known to influence growth of children born SGA. We studied the relationship between growth of children born SGA and MPH and studied the effects of insulin-like growth factor (IGF-I) and insulin-like growth factor binding protein 3 (IGFBP-3) on postnatal growth in children born SGA according to MPH.
Methods
Forty-nine neonates born SGA were included in this study. We defined corrected height standard deviation score (cHtSDS) by modified height SDS (HtSDS) based on their MPH. We categorized subjects into group 1 consisting of children with cHtSDS ≥0 (n=35) and group 2 consisting of children with cHtSDS <0 (n=14), and compared IGF-I and IGFBP-3 between the two groups.
Results
The HtSDSs and cHtSDSs in groups 1 and 2 were 0.06±1.05 vs. -0.95±0.85 (P=0.000) and 0.78±0.93 vs. -0.46± 0.67 (P=0.000), respectively. IGF-I SDS was higher in group 1 than in group 2 (2.82±3.69 vs. 0.23±2.42, P=0.012). Total cHtSDS (0.42±1.03) was significantly higher than HtSDS (-0.22±1.10) (P=0.000).
Conclusion
Our results show that cHtSDS differs significantly from HtSDS. Growth assessment by standardized growth curve does not uniformly show effects of genetic factors. A more accurate assessment of growth uses a personalized corrected growth curve that considers the genetic factor measured by MPH.

Keywords :Small for gestational age, Insulin-like growth factor, Insulin-like growth factor binding protein 3, Catch up growth