High protein intake boosts height in girls

Just seven grams over daily protein intake recommendation can increase height by one centimeter in girls

Hyderabad: A study by nutritionists at the University of Bonn, showed that while an increase in protein intake had no effect on body height in the boys and young men, a clear relationship was found in the girls.

According to the scientists’ calculations, an average increase of about seven grams of protein daily above the intake recommendations leads on average to an increase in height of one centimeter.

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The researchers studied a total of 189 healthy girls and boys and recorded protein intake not only from dietary survey data, but also by measuring urinary urea nitrogen excretion.

In principle, protein intake should not be higher than recommendations, such as 48 grams per day for 15- to 17-year-old female adolescents, the researchers said. Even at intakes clearly above requirements, protein still has significant growth-promoting effects in girls, they added.

“If no increase in height is desired, girls may even achieve a reduction in their later adult height by a few centimeters during growth by adjusting their protein intake to the recommendations, i.e. by not unnecessarily raising their protein intake,” they say.

However, this effect on height does not seem to play a relevant role in boys with protein intakes above requirements. Apparently for them, the scientists said, significantly stronger effects of sex hormones, including testosterone, on the growth hormone axis leave less room for an additional anabolic nutritional effect from protein.

The possible long-term consequences of correspondingly high protein intakes have not yet been satisfactorily examined.

For bone stability only, they observed positive relations with increased protein intake in past studies, provided that the fruit and vegetable intake was not too low and thus the diet-dependent acid load was not too high.

The DONALD (DOrtmund Nutritional and Anthropometric Longitudinally Designed) study is a long-term investigation of the effects of nutrition on physiological and health-related outcomes during and after the completion of growth.