"Xiong Haizi eats a lot of three meals a day, but why can't he grow up?"

In the consulting room, several mothers looked sad and anxiously asked the doctor why. They were worried that their children had short stature.

Can the child be short of stature? Is short stature and late development the same thing? Recently, Zhang Lina, the attending physician of pediatric endocrinology in Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, was interviewed by 39 Health Network to explain the criteria for judging short stature and share the secrets of improving height.

When the child's height is lower than the third place of the height of normal children of the same age, gender and race, or the average height is below -2SD, it means that the diagnostic criteria of dwarfism are reached.

So, in daily life, how to find children short at an early stage? Zhang Lina pointed out that if a child's height is ranked from high to low in the same class or grade, it is often ranked in the bottom three, so parents should be vigilant and check whether the child's growth and development are normal according to the child growth curve table.

At the same time, it can also be judged according to the growth speed of the child.

Normally, the growth rate of children (from 4 years old to before puberty) is about 5~7 cm per year. If it is less than 5 cm, the growth rate of children is slow. If the clothes worn three years ago still fit the child, it can indirectly show that the child's growth rate is slow.

Some parents tend to confuse stunting with dwarfism. Zhang Lina explained that the former refers to the late growth and height (that is, the late growth type), which is called "constitutional puberty delay" in medicine. This kind of children's height before puberty is the same as others or only slightly short, but they start later than their peers' puberty, and when puberty really comes, the height gap can catch up.

"Most of these children with late development will have a family history. Although they are short in height, the difference in bone age will not exceed 2 years."

In Zhang Lina's view, the reasons for children's short stature are complex and diverse, and are related to more than 300 diseases. The following are the most common:

If parents notice that there is a big gap in height or growth rate between their children and their peers, they should take their children to the children's endocrinology department in time.

"Height change is the epitome of children's health. No matter where there is a problem, it may be reflected from height." She said that for children diagnosed with short stature, it is necessary to find out the cause and treat them according to the cause, so as not to affect the height of adulthood.

Parents who are caught in height anxiety are not satisfied with the means of "exercise+diet" to help their children grow taller. More and more parents take the initiative to ask for injections of growth hormone for their children.

In this regard, Zhang Lina said that growth hormone can play a positive role in some diseases, but not all short children need to use growth hormone. She stressed that growth hormone is a prescription drug for treating diseases, not a health care product or a beauty product, and cannot be abused. It is generally suitable for growth hormone deficiency, Turner syndrome, Prader-Willi syndrome, idiopathic short stature and other indications, excluding contraindications and only when it is really needed can growth hormone therapy be started.

Parents should not use growth hormone without authorization, but start growth hormone therapy reasonably and scientifically under the guidance of doctors. Once the treatment is started, we should pay attention to regular follow-up, on the one hand, evaluate the curative effect, on the other hand, we should also monitor its side effects.

Although some children are short in height, they are not short and do not need medical treatment. Parents and children who are eager to "chase heights" can help them grow taller in the following four ways.

First, maintain a high-quality nutritional status. Pay attention to the daily intake of fish, meat, eggs, milk and staple food.

Second, do more sports, such as skipping rope, playing ball, pull-ups, high jump and so on.

Among them, skipping rope is called the most perfect height-growing exercise, because it has no space requirements, and it can also exercise the coordination of children's brains and limbs. It only takes 10 to 15 minutes to jump 800 to 1000 times every day, which can achieve good results in the long run. Parents can replace comfortable sports shoes for their children and help them keep exercising by playing music. However, in the process of exercise, we should pay attention to what we can do to avoid sports injuries.

Third, ensure adequate sleep and good sleep quality. Parents should urge their children to fall asleep as much as possible between 9: 30 and 10: 00 every night.

Fourth, keep a cheerful mood. The tense family atmosphere and the disharmony between parents may aggravate children's psychological pressure, even lead to depression and anxiety, which in turn may lead to children's short stature.

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