(3 of 3)
year, but he feels it is still only a help, and no
final answer.
Optimistic claims have also been made for the administration of a
synthetic hormone, similar to testosterone, to speed up the C.F.
victim's metabolism. But some doctors complain that improvement after
the treatment is mainly superficial and usually shortlived. There is
the disadvantage that after a brief growth spurt, a child may be
permanently stunted because the hormone shuts down the epiphyses
(growth ends) of long bones.
Beyond such controversy, the most encouraging news about C.F. is that
the combined effect of all the treatments has helped a great many
patients to live past adolescence into young adult life. What makes Dr.
di Sant'-Agnese and fellow workers in the field happiest is that seven
young women with C.F. have borne ten children and, as was hopefully
predicted from the recessive nature of the responsible gene, all their
offspring are normal.
