Reduced pericellular sensitivity to IGF-I in fibroblasts from girls with Turner syndrome: A mechanism to impair clinical responses to GH

Melissa Westwood, Shahin H. Tajbakhsh, Kirk W. Siddals, Andrew J. Whatmore, Peter E. Clayton

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Girls with Turner syndrome (TS) are treated with supraphysiological doses of growth hormone (GH) to improve final height; however in some girls, the growth response can be poor. This may reflect aberrations in GH and/or IGF-I actions at the cellular level, and thus this study compared the response of skin fibroblasts from normal children (n = 5) and girls with TS (n = 8) to GH, IGF-I, or a combination, by assessing the IGF binding protein (IGFBP) profile of conditioned medium harvested over 7 d. The two cell types had a comparable IGFBP profile; IGFBP-3 and IGFBP-4 were the most abundant species. TS fibroblasts produced more IGFBP-3 (d 7, 51.4 ± 45 ng/mL versus 20 ± 22 ng/mL; p <0.05) than control cells; levels of IGFBP-4 were similar (21 ±12 ng/mL versus 30 ± 21 ng/mL). GH did not influence IGFBP production. IGF-I treatment did not affect IGFBP-4 levels but enhanced the production of IGFBP-3 by both cell types (p <0.05). However, the response of TS fibroblasts to IGF-I was approximately half that observed in normal cells (p <0.05). Altered IGF-I activity, because of reduced bioavailabilty and/or reduced sensitivity, could contribute to the need for high GH doses in TS and for the poor response to GH in some girls with TS. Copyright ©; 2011 International Pediatric Research Foundation, Inc.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)25-30
Number of pages5
JournalPEDIATRIC RESEARCH
Volume70
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jul 2011

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