THE STATISTICAL-ANALYSIS OF NEONATAL TSH RESULTS FROM CONGENITAL HYPOTHYROIDISM SCREENING PROGRAMS PROVIDES A USEFUL TOOL FOR THE CHARACTERIZATION OF MODERATE IODINE DEFICIENCY REGIONS
G. Costante et al., THE STATISTICAL-ANALYSIS OF NEONATAL TSH RESULTS FROM CONGENITAL HYPOTHYROIDISM SCREENING PROGRAMS PROVIDES A USEFUL TOOL FOR THE CHARACTERIZATION OF MODERATE IODINE DEFICIENCY REGIONS, Journal of endocrinological investigation, 20(5), 1997, pp. 251-256
TSH data from the congenital hypothyroidism screening program were ana
lyzed in a mild to moderate iodine deficiency region. Neonatal TSH lev
els were measured at day 4-5 of life in 22,384 infants (99% coverage;
51.1% males, 48.9% females). The cut off TSH value for recall was esta
blished at 20 mu Ul/ml whole blood. TSH values >20 mu Ul/ml were exclu
ded from further analysis of the data. The frequency distribution anal
ysis showed that the median neonatal TSH level was 2 mu Ul/ml and the
mode (28% of newborns) corresponded to neonatal TSH values <1 mu Ul/ml
, TSH levels above 5 mu Ul/ml were observed in 14.4% children and the
97% cut off was 11 mu Ul/ml. When examined in relation to the areas of
newborn origin, the individual 97% cut off values varied from 8 to 14
mu Ul/ml. Accordingly, the frequency of TSH levels above the 97% cut
off value calculated for the entire newborn series (>11 mu Ul/ml) rang
ed from 2.1% to 4.6%, A significant correlation was found between the
frequency of neonatal TSH levels >11 mu Ul/ml and both goiter prevalen
ce (r(2) = 0.88; p = 0.0019) and median urinary iodine excretion (r(2)
= 0.86, p = 0.0077) observed in those areas for which epidemiological
data were available (n = 7), The results indicate that neonatal TSH d
ata from the congenital hypothyroidism screening programs can be used
for monitoring mild to moderate iodine deficiency regions, (C) 1997, E
ditrice Kurtis.