Growth is a sensitive indicator of a child’s state of health, nutrition and genetic background. Deviations from the normal range for both height and rate of growth may indicate an underlying congenital or acquired problem. Short stature is defined as height below the third percentile for chronological age and sex or height below 2 SD from the mean. Growth monitoring permits early detection of growth problems. The most frequent type of short stature is normal variant short stature. This group includes constitutional delay of growth and puberty and genetic-familial short stature. In differential diagnosis of normal variant short stature and short stature due to pathological causes, the most valuable parameter is growth velocity. Children and adolescents with decreased growth velocity should be evaluated by pediatric endocrinologists for pathological causes of short stature.

Keywords: <i>boy kısalığı, çocuk, büyüme, büyüme geriliği, algoritma.</i>