Management of Turner syndrome in adult life and beyond

Objective

To describe in practical terms the clinical management in adult life of patients with Turner syndrome.

Material & methods

Systematic review of the literature and practical issues. An evaluation of clinical trials, meta-analysis, case reports and reviews assessing the management of different conditions related to Turner syndrome was done using the following data sources: Medline, PubMed (from 1966 to July 2014) and the Cochrane Controlled Clinical Trials Register, Embase (up to July 2014).

Results

Extracted information is summarized here on karyotype, screening of malformations, malformations debuting in adult life, final height, treatments with growth hormone, cardiovascular risk, endocrino-metabolic and liver abnormalities, sensorineural disorders and osteoporosis and its treatment.

Conclusions

This review provides recommendations for the management of adult patients with Turner syndrome and insight into the associated medical complaints. A link between karyotypes and clinical features suggests a novel hypothesis to explain the different phenotypes and clinical abnormalities of these patients.