Treatment of Turner's syndrome with methionyl human growth hormone for six months.

Twenty patients with Turner's syndrome were treated with methionyl human growth hormone (met-hGH) produced by recombinant DNA technology. Plasma non-esterified fatty acid (NEFA) (mean +/- SEM) increased significantly from 0.52 +/- 0.06 to 1.30 +/- 0.09 mEq/l at 4 h after the first administration of 4 IU of met-hGH (P less than 0.001). Basal plasma somatomedin C (SM) levels were within the normal range; however, they increased significantly at 24 h after the first three daily injections of 4 IU of met-hGH (basal, 0.92 +/- 0.14; 24 h, 1.39 +/- 0.16; 48 h, 1.68 +/- 0.19; 72 h, 1.91 +/- 0.22 U/ml; P less than 0.001). For long-term treatment, the patients were given 16 IU of met-hGH per week for 6 months. The height increase during treatment was greater in 16 patients, but smaller in 4 than before treatment. The heights increased between 1.4 and 3.7 cm during 6 months of treatment, which corresponds to between 2.8 and 7.4 cm/year. The mean increase of 5.7 +/- 0.4 cm/year was greater than the pretreatment value of 3.7 +/- 0.2 cm/year (P less than 0.001). There was a positive correlation between growth rate and maximum increase in SM (r = 0.51, P less than 0.05). Antibody against hGH appeared in 3 patients after 2 months; 10 of the 20 patients had antibody after 6 months of treatment. However, the antibody did not suppress the growth effect of met-hGH. Otherwise there were no significant changes in physical, blood, or urine examinations. These results indicate that hGH treatment is useful for the acceleration of growth velocity in patients with Turner's syndrome.