Dear Editor,
We read with interest the article titled “Comparison of Commonly Used Methods to Predict the Final Height in Constitutional Tall Stature” by Matias et al. (1) published in the Journal of Clinical Research in Paediatric Endocrinology (Volume 15, Issue 1).
The article highlights prediction of adult height in children with constitutional tall stature. The investigators did an excellent job by including only children with constitutional tall stature and excluding other aetiologies of tall stature. They have done a tedious job at collecting all the records of growth and final height. We compliment the authors for addressing this highly contentious issue. The study concluded that Bayley-Pinneau chart approximates the final height better than Tanner-Whitehouse I method in children with constitutional tall stature. Investigators in the past also support using the Bayley-Pinneau method in this scenario (2).
However, there are a few issues we wish to raise. The first issue pertains to the definition of tall stature. Tall stature is taken as height beyond 97th percentile or more than 2 standard deviation (SD) above the mean height for age and sex in a defined population (3). The present study has adopted 90th percentile height as cut off to define tall stature. We believe that lowering the cut-off may increase the number of individuals with tall stature who may not require evaluation. de Waal et al. (2) have used 90th percentile to define tall stature in their study adopted from a Netherland data (4). We would like to know if any such data is available to apply the 90th percentile cut-off on Israeli population.
Second, the investigators have shown that the mean height SD score for boys returned to normal at the end of 17 years although for girls it remains elevated. This seems discrepant and a possible explanation for this would be welcome.
While we raise these issues, we once again congratulate the authors for analysing the height prediction methods and comparing them head-to-head. We believe this seminal work will open avenues for further research in this area and address more issues.