Investigating the effects of gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists on the body mass index of girls with central precocious puberty

• Autor(a) principal: Ana Beatriz Craveiro Nunes
• Data de Publicação: 2021
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://hdl.handle.net/10216/134554
• topic: Medicina clínica; Clinical medicine

Background: Gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists (GnRHa) are used to treat central precocious puberty (CPP). Many studies were performed to assess the impact of GnRHa on the body mass index (BMI) of these children, but the results are inconsistent. The aim of this study is to evaluate the effect of GnRHa treatment on the BMI of girls diagnosed with CPP. Methods: A retrospective longitudinal study was carried out with thirty-seven girls diagnosed with CPP. These were divided into two groups, a group of girls treated with GnRHa and a control group that did not undergo treatment. Considering their initial BMI, treated girls were also divided into normal weight (NW) group and overweight (OW)/obesity group. Results: At the end of treatment, there was no statistically significant difference between the BMI z-score of the treated group and the BMI z-score of the untreated group (p>0.05). Within the treated group, BMI z-score variation between the beginning and the end of the treatment was not statistically significant (p>0.05), as well as in the untreated group (p>0.05). During this period, there were no statistically significant changes in the weight z-score and the BMI z-score, both in the treated NW group and in the treated OW/obesity group (p>0.05). Conclusions: The GnRHa treatment of CPP did not condition an increase in girls' BMI z-score. We also concluded that the initial BMI z-score of the patients does not influence the variation of the BMI z-score throughout the treatment.