ESPE Yearbook of Paediatric Endocrinology

As usual, the year in research in Oncology and chronic disease has been very rich. Most of the highlighted papers investigate the effects of cancer treatment on the endocrine system. Issues related to long-term surveillance strategies represent an emerging topic of discussion.

Furthermore, a few key points about growth retardation as a common complication of different chronic systemic diseases in children have been defined:

• the therapeutic switch from glucocorticoids to biologic agents has dramatically changed the clinical scenario of chronic inflammatory diseases. The use of these agents early in the course of the disease has been correlated with a dramatic improvement of growth outcome. The restoration of a normal linear growth rate seems to be directly related with an early response to therapy and with the achievement of a sustained remission.

• treatment with recombinant human growth hormone (rhGH) has been proposed to help children with chronic systemic conditions (such as chronic kidney disease and severe juvenile idiopathic arthritis) to attain a height more in keeping with their peers, but until now the scientific evidence regarding the effect of rhGH on adult height was scarce. A few data published this year seem to confirm that long-term rhGH therapy reduces the deceleration of linear growth and ultimately improves final height.