The growth of height is greatly influenced by genetic, endocrine and intrauterine growth levels. There are three ages for children in the growth phase: (1) actual age (2) height age (3) bone age Medical science can predict the growth potential by observing the process of bone growth to determine the maturity of bones, which means that height can be predicted by bone age.
The physical examination of children should include bone age, and their growth and development should be judged comprehensively by their age, bone age, height and development to predict their adult lifetime height.
It is inaccurate to predict a child’s adult height solely by the parents’ height. This calculated height is called genetic height, which is only one aspect of determining a child’s height, and a physical examination solely by actual age and height is also incomplete and should be judged comprehensively. Due to the influence of genetic, environmental, nutritional and disease factors, the actual age and bone age of children are often inconsistent, and it is more obvious in children with precocious puberty, where the bone age exceeds the actual age by more than one year in general. The prediction of adult height is based on the height of a particular child’s actual bone age, so that we know how long the child has left before the end of growth, so that we can take clinically targeted measures to make him/her get the relatively ideal height. The dynamic tracking of individual bone age is particularly important in the diagnosis and treatment of children with precocious puberty.