Limiting sales of the hormone to children diagnosed with growth hormone deficiency, rather than being short for any reason, limited their sales market. Expanding it to all children whose height was below the third percentile would create 90,000 new customers and US$10 billion in revenue. In the early 1990s, they paid two US charities, the Human Growth Foundation and the MAGIC Foundation, to measure the height of thousands of American children in schools and public places, and to send letters urging medical consultations for children whose height was deemed low. Parents and schools were not told that the charities were being paid by the drug companies to do this.Paired with a campaign to advertise the hormone to physicians, the campaign was successful, and tens of thousands of children began receiving HGH. About half of them do not have growth hormone deficiency, and consequently benefited very little, if at all, from the hormone injections. Criticism of the universal screening program eventually resulted in its end. Advantage
Short stature decreases the risk of venous insufficiency. History
During World War I in Britain, the minimum height for soldiers was 5 feet 3 inches (160 cm). Thus thousands of men under this height were denied the opportunity to fight in the war. As a result of pressure to allow them entry, special "Bantam Battalions" were created composed of men who were 4 feet 10 inches (147 cm) to 5 feet 3 inches (160 cm). By the end of the war there were 29 Bantam Battalions of about 1,000 men each.
Disproportionate short stature can be further subdivided as specified by the body segments affected by shortening, namely limbs versus trunk:
Short-limb short stature in which there is limb shortening as achondroplasia, hypochondroplasia, pseudoachondroplasia and multiple epiphyseal dysplasia. Short-trunk short stature in which there is trunk shortening as spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia and mucopolysaccharidosisShort-limb short stature can be further subcategorised in accordance with limb segment affected by shortening. These subcategories of limb shortening include, rhizomelic (humerus and femur), mesomelic (radius, ulna, tibia and fibula) and acromelic (hands and feet). Anthropometric measurements provide are very beneficial tools to the diagnostic process of genetic skeletal dysplasias. The anthropometric measurements include height, sitting height, arm span, upper/ lower-body segment ratio, sitting height/height ratio, and arm span/height ratio for age. They also aid in the differential diagnosis of skeletal dysplasia subtypes. Treatment
The decision to treat is based on a belief that the child will be disabled by being extremely short as an adult, so that the risks of treatment (including sudden death) will outweigh the risks of not treating the symptom of short stature. Although short children commonly report being teased about their height, most adults who are very short are not physically or psychologically disabled by their height. However, there is some evidence to suggest that there is an inverse linear relationship with height and with risk of suicide.Treatment is expensive and requires many years of injections with human growth hormones.