CSF somatostatin in childhood psychiatric disorders: a preliminary investigation.

Disruptive behavior disorders and obsessive-compulsive disorder have been associated with serotonergic dysfunction as well as particular body habitus findings in pediatric patients. Somatostatin, a peptide which stimulates serotonin release and inhibits growth hormone release, was measured in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of 10 children with disruptive behavior disorders and in 10 age-, sex-, and race-matched pairs of obsessive-compulsive disorder patients. Decreased concentrations of somatostatin were found in disruptive behavior disorder patients relative to obsessive-compulsive children, even after controlling for differences in Tanner stage. In contrast to studies in adults, those patients in a depressed state did not have lower CSF somatostatin concentration.