Hello all!
My lab is currently doing some work with a hormone called ghrelin. One of the most striking actions of ghrelin is that it increases appetite. When I found this out, I immediately thought "Well, I hear that taking steriods increases hunger" and wondered what the link between the two hormones was. There also seems to be an increase in ghrelin when there is stress. In one study, mice underwent a tail pinch (I know, researchers are horrible people!) and their cortisol and ghrelin levels both increased!
In addition to causing an increase in food intake, ghrelin also stimulates the release of growth hormone. So I started putting things into context with CAH again. Kids with undersupressed have advanced bone ages- low cortisol levels, high ghrelin levels. Kids who are oversuppressed, slower bone maturity- high cortisol, but low ghrelin. This doesn’t quite match up with the tail pinch experiment where it kinda suggests the two are positively correlated- but I have to think these two hormones are somehow linked!
Has anyone had an endo suggest that a child with a ’underaged’ bone age take growth hormone to catch up? I was wondering if this was common with children that were oversupressed. Dr. New also published a study on it last year- tho I havent found the paper yet so I can see what it says! My child is rather petite, but she’s only 2 so I haven’t quite started worrying about whether or not she needs to take GH yet!

I’d also be interested in hearing what other people think about this concept- there’s no definitive research out there linking the two quite yet. We’re actually working more with how ghrelin affects the ovary and how it may cause the ovary to regress. This is not offical research, just a parent with a child with CAH mind going into overdrive! Thanks--

MarthaF