Normal growth of nephrotic children during long-term alternate-day prednisone therapy.

Statural growth has been evaluated in 20 prepubertal nephrotic children who received alternate-day prednisone therapy for a year at least. Bone age was assessed in 16 of these children after 1-4 years of therapy. During the follow-up 12 children showed variations in height standard deviation score (SDs) below 0.5, 7 gained more than 0.5 SDs and 1 lost 0.5 SDs. Bone age fell within the normal range for chronological age in all the children studied. On the while alternate-day prednisone therapy does not affect statural growth and bone maturation of children with lipoid nephrosis.