Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Growth hormone replacement (GHRT) during conception and pregnancy is an off-label treatment. Reports on pregnancy outcomes in women with growth hormone deficiency (GHD) are derived from single center studies with small sample sizes and show conflicting results.

Methods/design: We evaluate pregnancies reported in the KIMS (Pfizer International Metabolic Database) patients on GHRT. KIMS includes 4651 women aged 15–50 years (followed for 19348 patient-years; median 3.10 years) and 7438 men aged above 16 years (followed for 36074 patient-years; median 3.89 years).

Results: There were 151 pregnancies reported in 131 patients of which 116 were in women (aged 22–41 years) and 15 in partners of male patients (aged 26–68 years). Only 14 women (10%) and one man had stopped GHRT before conception. Reported GHRT during pregnancy in females was as follows: continuation in 24% of the cases, withdrawal in 56% and dose reduction in 2%. Within the cohort that stopped GH during the pregnancy, 46% gave birth to healthy babies, 12% reported fetal loss, and outcome is not reported in 42% of the cases. Within the cohort that continued GH during pregnancy, 41% gave birth to healthy babies, 34% reported fetal loss, and outcome is not reported in 24% of the cases. At the time of abstract submission, birth of 82 healthy children (including twins and triplets) has been confirmed; 14 in women who continued GH during pregnancy and 6 with paternal exposure to GH.

Conclusions: In summary, here we provide the first demographic data on pregnancy rates in a large cohort of patients receiving GHRT. It appears that in the clinical practice setting, nearly all patients taking GH replacement continue treatment during the time when they seek fertility, and one-fourth continue it during pregnancy, but further data are needed and the work is ongoing.

Declaration of interest: I fully declare a conflict of interest. Details below:

Funding: This work was supported, however funding details unavailable.