The effect of growth hormone replacement therapy in hypopituitary adults on calcium and bone metabolism.

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial looks at Exogenous HGH, sermorelin & older GHRPs (why they're passed over).

The importance of growth hormone (GH) for normal skeletal growth in childhood and adolescence is well established but much less is known about its action on the adult skeleton.

The researchers therefore wished to investigate the effects of replacement treatment with biosynthetic human GH in hypopituitary adults on aspects of calcium homeostasis, bone metabolism and bone mineral mass.

Why It Was Studied

Patients were reviewed at 1, 3 and 6 months.

Who Took Part

The study group was 6 patients.

The age groups tagged for this paper are adults, middle-aged adults and older adults, both men and women.

Forty hypopituitary adults (21 females and 19 males; aged 19-67 years).

Bone mineral density of total body and lumbar spine was also measured by dual energy X-ray absorptiometry at 0 and 6 months in 12 patients on GH and 14 on placebo.

How the Study Was Run

The researchers set it up as a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

The patients were allocated by chance, so the Exogenous HGH, sermorelin & older GHRPs (why they're passed over) group and the comparison group should start out alike.

Neither the patients nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Exogenous HGH, sermorelin & older GHRPs (why they're passed over), so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

The comparison arm used a placebo, so changes seen with Exogenous HGH, sermorelin & older GHRPs (why they're passed over) could be set against what happens without it.

Plasma calcium, phosphate and total plasma alkaline phosphatase were measured at 0, 1, 3 and 6 months.

Serum insulin like growth factor I (IGF-I), osteocalcin, procollagen 1 carboxyterminal peptide (P1CP) and intact parathyroid hormone (PTH) level, 24-hour urinary calcium and creatinine excretion were all measured at 0 and 6 months.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Bone Density, Bone and Bones, Calcium, Growth Hormone, Hypopituitarism, Insulin-Like Growth Factor I and Osteogenesis.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Exogenous HGH, sermorelin & older GHRPs (why they're passed over) in 6 patients.

With fewer than 40 people, it is a small study, so it is better read as an early signal for further research than as a settled answer.

The abstract goes on to report its results in about 11 sentences; this page does not restate them, so read the paper for the findings and their limits.

The publication is from 1994 (Clinical endocrinology), a journal based in England.

More context: the Exogenous HGH, sermorelin & older GHRPs (why they're passed over) compound page, all human trials.