You can’t rejuvenate yourself
The growth of a person depends, as a rule, on his endocrine status – the level of hormones and the consistency of their action in the body. “The first violin” in this orchestra is played by growth hormone, or somatotropin, which is responsible for the increase in bone length and width, muscle growth, internal organs, and also participates in metabolism, for example, stimulates protein synthesis. Its main role is the formation and renewal of different tissues with the accumulation of energy.
Growth hormone is a protein consisting of 191 amino acids. It is produced in the pituitary gland and is released periodically throughout the day, for example, under the influence of stress or physical activity, but most of all during sleep. It does not act directly in the body, but indirectly through insulin-like growth factors.
In children and adolescents, growth hormone is synthesized in greater amounts than in adults, and by old age its secretion becomes minimal. For this feature, scientists called it the hormone of youth. There was even an idea that somatotropin could be used to delay old age. After all, estrogens are used in menopause, so why don’t elderly people have growth hormone replacement therapy? But experiments have shown that not everything is so simple. When injections of the hormone were given to young mice, they grew faster and were larger than their relatives, but died earlier than usual. The growth hormone seemed to speed up all the cycles of life, thereby shortening it. When it was administered to old mice, they continued to be healthy when the control group was already dying out.
However, for people this method of “rejuvenation” is unacceptable due to side effects: fluid retention with edema of the extremities, arthralgias, myalgias, impaired glucose tolerance, intracranial hypertension, carpal tunnel syndrome (pain in the hand, impaired sensitivity of the fingers due to compression of the nerve by surrounding tissues). In the presence of various tumors in the body, the hormone can stimulate their development. In addition, long-term use of growth hormone by people with normal levels of growth hormone causes irreversible changes in appearance. Bones become wider, hands, feet, ears, nose, teeth and chin grow. The heart and kidneys may also become enlarged, which can lead to disease. The exact same picture is observed in acromegaly. This pathology develops in people whose pituitary gland produces a lot of somatotropin, and linear bone growth is no longer possible because puberty has ended and the growth points at the ends of the bones are closed.
The ultimate fat burner
Somatotropin is also largely responsible for the size of a person’s waistline. This is regulated by a complex mechanism: when there is no food in the body, glucose and insulin levels decrease, and the secretion of growth hormone increases. It is under its influence that fatty acids are released from fat depots and become fuel for all energy processes in the body. Most of all fats are “burned” at night, so we not only grow but also lose weight in our sleep. If we eat before bedtime, the growth hormone will not be properly activated, and the extra nutrients will turn into fat deposits. As we age, the work of this system is disturbed: a slight and short-term increase in blood glucose levels is enough to significantly slow down the release of growth hormone. And if there is little of it, fat is gradually accumulated. In childhood, the energy supply mechanism works paradoxically: the level of growth hormone and fatty acids in the blood is simultaneously high, because both are essential for the development of the body.
Studies in recent years have shown that women synthesize more growth hormone than men. It is hypothesized that it affects mood, emotions and even thought process. And the fact that somatotropin is important for immune defense has already been proven.
The length of a newborn baby is 50-54 cm. During the first year of life, the child’s growth increases by 25 cm (16-17 cm in the first six months and about 8 cm in the following ones). In the second year of life, he should grow by 10-12 cm. In the next three years – uniformly by 6-8 cm per year, and further, until puberty – by 5-6 cm per year. During adolescence, the growth rate increases, the “jump” begins at the age of about 10 years for girls and 12 years for boys. During puberty, growth increases by 20-25 cm. By 18-20 years of age, this process ends.
Abundance and deficiency
The growth rate of the child depends on constitutional and hereditary features, but it should be within the limits of the norm. At the slightest suspicion that there are deviations in one direction or another, it is worth undergoing a medical examination.
If the child grows like a yeast, it is necessary to check the level of thyroid hormones to rule out hyperthyroidism. With a relative excess of sex hormones, he may also be taller than his peers, but with the end of puberty, and therefore the closure of growth zones will cease to stretch upward. People rarely become giants because of growth hormone. This is possible if there was a pituitary adenoma in childhood, or it was damaged as a result of trauma or surgery, resulting in excessive production of somatotropin. The cause of abnormally large growth is more often not endocrine disorders, but lesions of the brain, such as Sotos syndrome, or connective tissue.
In general, many more people suffer from short stature. In about 8-9% of cases, this is due to a lack of somatotropin, the level of which is determined by the concentration of the main insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1) and its binding protein (IGFBP-3). When born, these babies have a normal body length. Growth retardation usually becomes noticeable in them during the preschool period, and the bone age lags behind the real one (established by X-ray examination). This pathology is called pituitary nannism. If it is left untreated, with regular injections of somatoropin from the earliest possible age until the end of puberty, the height of an adult woman will not exceed 125 cm and that of a man will not exceed 145 cm.
It also happens that the level of somatotropin is normal, but the child still does not grow. This may be Kovarsky syndrome, in which the growth hormone has a genetic defect, and therefore biologically inactive. And Laron syndrome is characterized even by an increased level of somatotropin against the background of pronounced growth retardation. The cause of the disease is that growth hormone can not bind on the surface of the cell with its receptor, because it has damage. In such cases, the desired result is given by the use of IGF-1. By the way, it was recently found out why the smallest people on the planet – pygmies living in the tropical forests of Northern Zaire – are not taller than 1.4 meters. They have normal levels of growth hormone and concentration of insulin-like factor, but the cells do not respond to it properly, because the functions of the IGF-1 receptor are impaired.
There are many other causes of growth retardation. These include hypothyroidism, excess glucocorticoids, chronic renal failure, etc. Dwarfism can even be psychological. This phenomenon is sometimes observed in problem families. If parents do not give their warmth to the child, the child may have stunted growth with delayed bone age and mental development. Such children may have an increased appetite, suffer from bedwetting, and often show aggression. Under normal circumstances, they begin to grow, but their intelligence remains reduced for life.
Many professional athletes and bodybuilders use growth hormone in high doses to increase strength and endurance, as this powerful anabolic cannot be detected in doping controls.
Treatment cannot be delayed?
In most cases of stunting, children need a growth hormone preparation. Nowadays, genetically engineered somatotropin is produced by several foreign pharmaceutical companies, and a domestic preparation has recently appeared.
If a child receiving growth hormone becomes 1 cm taller per month, this indicates that the therapy is effective. In some cases, growth hormone is required for life, in gradually decreasing doses, to maintain metabolism.
Somatotropin treatment is very expensive, but since 2001, a regulation has come into force that obliges the Ukrainian state health authorities to provide children who need it free of charge. However, there are many problems in this area of medicine, as well as in the industry as a whole. The financial factor and the human factor – children get to specialists late or doctors do not recognize pathologies, parents do not regularly give injections… But in the West, all young people are mostly of advanced age. Children are treated in time, and they grow up as healthy peers.
Shutterstock/FOTODOM UKRAINE photos were used
