Cited by 205Growth Hormone and Insulin-like Growth FactorsHypothalamic control of reproductive hormonesSleep and Wakefulness Research

A quantitative estimation of growth hormone secretion in normal man: reproducibility and relation to sleep and time of day

Van Cauter, E.·1992·Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism

Abstract

Recent reports, based on measurements of plasma GH levels, have challenged the concept that GH secretion is dependent on sleep and not modulated by circadian rythmicity. Because plasma levels reflect not only the secretory process, but also the effects of distribution and degradation, temporal limits of active secretion and, consequently, synchrony with other physiological events cannot be accurately estimated from circulating concentrations. The present study was undertaken to examine the roles of sleep and time of day in modulating pulsatile GH secretion, using a mathematical procedure (deconvolution) allowing secretory rates to be estimated from peripheral levels. Eight young nonobese healthy men participated each in six separate 16-h studies involving either normal or delayed sleep. Plasma GH levels were measured at 15-min intervals, and GH secretory rates were calculated by deconvolution. Each individual study was preceded by one night of habituation, and sleep was polygraphically recorded in all studies. Repeated measurements of plasma insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) were performed in all subjects. Deconvolution revealed the existence of approximately 20% more GH pulses than detected in the plasma profiles. Large peaks of plasma GH concentrations often reflected the occurrence of a succession of secretory pulses. The total amount of GH secreted varied 10-fold across individual studies, but the within-subject variability (32%) was less than half the across-subject variability (65%). IGF-I levels were also more reproducible for a given subject than across subjects (11% vs. 36% variability) and did not correlate with the amount of GH secreted. During normal waking hours, the GH secretory rate was similar in the evening and the morning. This secretory rate was doubled during wakefulness at times of habitual sleep and tripled during sleep, even when sleep was delayed until 0400 h. A pulse starting within 30 min after sleep onset was present in all profiles with normal sleep and in 13 of 16 profiles with delayed sleep. The amount of GH secreted in response to sleep onset was tightly correlated with the level of secretion during wakefulness (r = 0.92). Almost 70% (57 of 83) of the pulses occurring during sleep were associated with slow wave (SW) stages. The amount of GH secreted in SW-associated pulses was correlated with the amount of SW occurring during the pulse, even when sleep-onset pulses were not considered. We conclude that in normal adult men, the amount of GH secretion and the levels of IGF-I are more reproducible within than across individuals.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1210/jc.74.6.1441

Cites

0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

We couldn’t retrieve this paper’s full text, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • In healthy young men, a major growth hormone pulse accounting for about 70% of daily production occurs shortly after sleep onset, associated with the first phase of slow wave sleep.

    “in healthy young men, a major GH pulse that accounts for roughly 70% of the daily production occurs shortly after sleep onset [188], in association with the first phase of slow wave sleep (SWS).”

    From Sleep and metabolic function (2012) · cites this paper as [188]

Cites

The publisher hasn’t deposited this paper’s reference list.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Van Cauter, E.
Venue
Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism
Published
1992-06-01
Volume
74
Issue
6
Pages
1441-1450
ISSN
0021-972X (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2122344008
Cited by
205
References
0
Citations by year
2025: 1 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 3 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 6 · 2014: 6 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 9
FWCI
4.68
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
  • The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Dépôt institutionnel de l'Université libre de Bruxelles (Université Libre de Bruxelles) (submittedVersion)
Funders
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (R01DK032632, DK32632, DK-41814, R01DK041814)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism › Growth Hormone and Insulin-like Growth Factors
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Reproductive Medicine › Hypothalamic control of reproductive hormones
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Sleep and Wakefulness Research
Keywords
growth hormone secretion, pulsatile secretion, sleep, circadian rhythm, sleep onset delay, insulin-like growth factor I, deconvolution, slow-wave sleep, reproducibility, healthy men, within-person variability, between-subject variability
MeSH terms
Adult, Circadian Rhythm, Humans, Insulin-Like Growth Factor I, Male, Reference Values, Sleep, Sleep, REM, Growth Hormone, Wakefulness

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review