Pubertal growth of 1,453 healthy children according to age at pubertal growth spurt onset. The Barcelona longitudinal growth study

• Published in: Anales de Pediatría 2018-09, Vol.89 (3), p.144-152
• Main Authors: Carrascosa, Antonio, Yeste, Diego, Moreno-Galdó, Antonio, Gussinyé, Miquel, Ferrández, Ángel, Clemente, María, Fernández-Cancio, Mónica
• Format: Article
• Language: eng ; spa
• ISSN: 2341-2879
• DOI: 10.1016/j.anpedi.2017.11.018

INTRODUCTIONPubertal growth pattern differs according to age at pubertal growth spurt onset which occurs over a five years period (girls: 8-13 years, boys: 10-15 years). The need for more than one pubertal reference pattern has been proposed. We aimed to obtain five 1-year-age-interval pubertal patterns. SUBJECTS AND METHODSLongitudinal (6 years of age-adult height) growth study of 1,453 healthy children to evaluate height-for-age, growth velocity-for-age and weight-for-age values. According to age at pubertal growth spurt onset girls were considered: very-early matures (8-9 years, n=119), early matures (9-10 years, n=157), intermediate matures (10-11 years, n=238), late matures (11-12 years, n=127) and very-late matures (12-13 years, n=102), and boys: very-early matures (10-11 years, n=110), early matures (11-12 years, n=139), intermediate matures (12-13 years, n=225), late matures (13-14 years, n=133) and very-late matures (14-15 years, n=103). Age at menarche and growth up to adult height were recorded. RESULTSIn both sexes, statistically-significant (P