Department of Radiology, Xi'an Peoples Hospital (Xi'an Fourth Hospital), Xi'an 710004, Shanxi, China.
Department of Radiology, Xi'an Children's Hospital, Xi'an 710003, Shanxi, China.
Contrast Media Mol Imaging. 2022 Aug 10;2022:3111585. doi: 10.1155/2022/3111585. eCollection 2022.
This study aims to explore the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings of the pituitary gland (PG) in children with growth hormone deficiency (GHD) and their correlation with the growth hormone (GH) peak during clinical GH stimulation tests. Sixty-one children with GHD diagnosed and treated between December 2018 and December 2021 were retrospectively analyzed in terms of clinical and pituitary morphological MRI data. MRI measurements of various diameters of the adenohypophysis (AH) were obtained to analyze the differences of the measured values in different genders and age groups, as well as their relationship with the GH peak in GH stimulation tests. Among the 61 children with GHD, the superior PG margin was protuberant in 2 cases, flat in 13 cases, and concave in 46 cases. The three age groups showed similar pituitary morphology and stalk ( > 0.05). On T1-weighted images, the proportion of isointensity was lower while the proportion of slightly-low signal intensity was higher in the anterior pituitary gland (APG) of children aged >10 compared with those aged 7-10. The comparison of AH linear parameters and GH peak values of male patients among different age groups showed that the anteroposterior (sagittal) diameter of AH and GH peak were the highest in the >10-year-old group and the lowest in the ≤6-year-old group, with those of the 7-10-year-old group in between ( < 0.05). In females, the anteroposterior (sagittal) diameter and GH peak were higher in the 7-10-year-old group and >10-year-old group compared with the ≤6-year-old group ( < 0.05). The MRI coronal and sagittal heights of PG in children with GHD were positively correlated with the GH peak value. In conclusion, in GHD patients, the coronal and sagittal heights as well as the coronal width of AH do not change with sex or age, but the coronal and sagittal heights of PG are positively correlated with the GH peak of GH stimulation tests, which has high application value in the diagnosis of children with GHD.
本研究旨在探讨生长激素缺乏症（GHD）患儿垂体（PG）的磁共振成像（MRI）表现及其与临床生长激素（GH）刺激试验中 GH 峰的相关性。回顾性分析 2018 年 12 月至 2021 年 12 月期间诊断和治疗的 61 例 GHD 患儿的临床和垂体形态 MRI 数据。测量各种腺垂体（AH）直径的 MRI 值，分析不同性别和年龄组测量值的差异，以及它们与 GH 刺激试验中 GH 峰的关系。在 61 例 GHD 患儿中，2 例 PG 上缘突出，13 例平坦，46 例凹陷。三组垂体形态和柄均相似（>0.05）。在 T1 加权图像上，与 7-10 岁组相比，>10 岁组儿童的前垂体（APG）等信号比例较低，稍低信号比例较高。不同年龄组男性患者 AH 线性参数和 GH 峰值比较显示，>10 岁组 AH 前后（矢状）径和 GH 峰值最高，≤6 岁组最低，7-10 岁组居中（<0.05）。女性中，7-10 岁组和>10 岁组的前后（矢状）径和 GH 峰值均高于≤6 岁组（<0.05）。GHD 患儿 PG 的冠状和矢状高度与 GH 峰值呈正相关。总之，在 GHD 患者中，AH 的冠状和矢状高度以及冠状宽度不受性别或年龄的影响，但 PG 的冠状和矢状高度与 GH 刺激试验中的 GH 峰值呈正相关，在儿童 GHD 的诊断中有较高的应用价值。
