Dwarfs, Laron

In a 6-month treatment trial of a group of these patients with hGH, Rudman et al. (17) found that their acute (10-day) and chronic (6-month) SM-C/IGF-I responses were highly correlated, and that both responses showed a very high association with the increased growth velocity at the end of the test period. Patients with this condition might normally be denied GH therapy as they do not satisfy criteria for GH deficiency, but it appears from these studies that GH treatment would he of benefit and, importantly, that a short-term trial of GH administration, monitoring SM-C/IGF-I levels, would differentiate this group fiom Laron dwarfs or other nonresponders. 

Such effects render IGFs likely therapeutic candidates in treating the various forms of dwarfism caused by a dysfunction in some element of the GH-IGF growth axis. Initial trials show that s.c. administration of recombinant human IGF-I over a 12-month period significantly increases the growth rate of Laron-type dwarfs. 

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