My eight year old daughter has both diabetes (diagnosed at the age of two) and growth hormone deficiency (diagnosed at age three). I have asked her doctor on how taking both growth hormone and insulin at the same time might be affecting her uncontrollable highs and lows. We have tried diet along with several insulin changes, and I can’t seem to get an answer if this will get better over time or if we just have to accept this as a side effect.

Do children have problems with when dealing with both disease? Are there very many other children with both these diseases?

It is extremely rare to have both growth hormone deficiency and type 1 diabetes. I would not expect that the growth hormone would cause defined blood glucose abnormalities but some detective work with blood glucose testing should answer this question over a week or so.

If you see a pattern that is reproducible (several hours after the growth hormone is given the blood glucose levels rise), then you can adjust the insulin or food at that time to counterbalance. If you think that there are blood glucose levels bouncing around, this is not likely to be related to the growth hormone, of course.

I would guess the blood glucose problems are not growth hormone related but more related to what insulin, when you are getting the insulin, food and activity changes etc. You should review this in some detail with your daughter’s endocrine team since they can give you the best specific advice once you show them the blood glucose detective work results.

SB