Factors influencing height gain in children born small for gestational age treated with recombinant growth hormone: what extent is puberty involved?

Most SGA patients achieve normalization of height above -2 SD, the percentage being higher in girls. According to our predictive model, height gain in the first year is the most important variable for predicting good response to treatment. During puberty, there is a loss of height SDS, probably due to a lower total pubertal gain with respect to the reference population, which is more marked in boys.