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Puberty without Gonadotropins
- Source :
- New England Journal of Medicine. 312:65-72
- Publication Year :
- 1985
- Publisher :
- Massachusetts Medical Society, 1985.
-
Abstract
- Recent evidence suggests that a group of children exists in whom premature sexual maturation occurs in the absence of pubertal levels of gonadotropins; that is, they have gonadotropin-independent precocious puberty. We compared six boys and one girl with this disorder with four boys and five girls with central precocious puberty, in which there is a pubertal pattern of gonadotropin release. The two groups were similar in age of onset, degree of sexual development, growth velocity, and rate of skeletal maturation. A family history of precocity was noted in four of the boys with gonadotropin-independent precocity, and the girl had McCune-Albright syndrome. Children with central precocious puberty demonstrated a pulsatile release of gonadotropins, pubertal responses to luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone, and complete suppression of gonadarche after exposure to an analogue of luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone (LHRHa). In contrast, children with gonadotropin-independent precocity demonstrated an absence of gonadotropin pulsations, variable responses to luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone, lack of suppression of puberty in response to LHRHa, and cyclic steroidogenesis. Tissue from testicular biopsies performed in five of six boys with gonadotropin-independent precocity showed a range from incipient pubertal development of the tubules with proliferation of Leydig cells to the appearance of normal adult testes. We conclude that gonadotropin-independent precocious puberty is a distinct syndrome, of unknown cause, that may be familial and may have been responsible for many previously reported cases of precocious puberty.
- Subjects :
- Male
endocrine system
medicine.medical_specialty
medicine.drug_class
media_common.quotation_subject
Puberty, Precocious
Gonadotropin-Releasing Hormone
Internal medicine
medicine
Humans
Sexual maturity
Precocious puberty
Testosterone
Sexual Maturation
Girl
Family history
Child
media_common
Estradiol
business.industry
Obstetrics and Gynecology
Leydig Cells
General Medicine
Luteinizing Hormone
medicine.disease
Endocrinology
Gonadarche
Female
Follicle Stimulating Hormone
Age of onset
Gonadotropin
business
Neuroscience
Mechanism (sociology)
Gonadotropins
hormones, hormone substitutes, and hormone antagonists
Hormone
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 15334406 and 00284793
- Volume :
- 312
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- New England Journal of Medicine
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....8c59b9fe8cb40508e5af0c78b90a5d2f
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1056/nejm198501103120201