Disease-specific standards in congenital syndromes

A number of congenital diseases are associated with growth disorders. Over the past decade, efforts have been made to define disease-specific growth standards for these diseases. Such standards allow patients to be counselled, and it is useful to take the predicted growth of an individual into account before initiating any treatment regimen. In addition, knowledge of the growth pattern associated with a particular disorder may facilitate a greater understanding of the pathology of the disease, and deviations from the predicted pattern of growth may be indicative of additional disease processes. However, although growth standards are extremely useful, it is important to note that they are subject to a number of biases, which result from the way in which the study on which data used to calculate the standards was conducted. Until these biases are addressed, the standards that are currently available will not be entirely suitable for routine use.