Some time ago, Dr. Philip Cohen and I studied the effect of thyroid therapy on children,1 and found that thyroid extract in small or moderate doses did not increase the basal metabolic rate of children whose initial basal metabolic rate was normal. When the basal metabolism was subnormal, thyroid extract even in very small doses caused an increase in it. At the same time it was noticed that the children who had been receiving thyroid extract showed an unusual increase in growth during the period of therapy.Since the publication of these results, I have had the opportunity to study further the effects of thyroid therapy on children, and this paper presents my observations. Sixteen children were studied over a period of from three months to two years. Unfortunately, the district in which our hospital stands has been rapidly changing from a Jewish to a Porto Rican population, and through change of address, several patients disappeared from observation before their cases were concluded.The children were selected because of mental or physical retardation in development. Hutchison,2 Bauer,3 Bassoe 4 and other investigators considered any departure from the orderly procedure of development to be, to a certain extent, of endocrine origin. This includes abnor¬ malities of height or weight without apparent cause, delayed epiphyseal development, delayed closing of the fontanels, irregular dentition, retarded puberty and retarded intelligence unaccounted for otherwise. With this in mind, sixteen patients showing retarded development were selected for study. None of these children was definitely cretinous or myxedematous. There was no obvious defect of the thyroid gland. There is no doubt as to the value of treatment with thyroid extract in cases of unquestioned thyroid deficiency. It seems possible also that in certain cases in which deficiencies of the thyroid gland are not so obvious, thyroid therapy might be effective.
