A Biometric Study of the Excretion of Corticosteroids in Children in Relation to Age, Height and Weight

Abstract

rJHIS STUDY is based on data made available in an investigation by -IKing and Mason (Ref. 1) in which the urinary excretion of corticosteroids was determined for 87 normal children (28 boys, 59 girls) including newly born babies and children up to 16 years of age. On approximately the same day as the urine was collected for the determination of the corticosteroids, measurements of height and weight without clothes were made. Urine was collected during twenty-four hours in glass bottles without preservative. The parents and the children were instructed as to the necessity of accurate collection of the urine. They were questioned afterward and if there was any doubt as to the accuracy of the collection, the specimen was discarded. The method for the determination of the corticosteroids has been described by Corcoran and Page (Ref. 2). The values for the urinary corticosteroids are expressed as milligrams of 11-dehydrocorticosterone per twenty-four hours. The mean corticosteroid output per twenty-four hours increases steadily with age (fig. 1). Since, however, during this period the weight and the height are both increasing, it is pertinent to inquire whether the increase of output is related to either or both of these, rather than to age per se. Talbot (Ref. 3) reported that if the output of corticosteroids is expressed in ratio to surface area, the surface area being measured by the formula of DuBois (S. A. = 0.00718 WO0 425 H0 725), the output does not change with age. This finding we (lid not confirm in our data. The mean