In Reply.—This is in reply to the letter to the editor by Drs Leheup and Pierson, in which the authors describe their experience with clonidine hydrochloride for GH stimulation and conclude that such a test (even in the dose of 150 μg/sq m) is unreliable and inferior to other tests, namely, arginine-insulin and betaxolol-glucagon.
Although we agree that the clonidine test is only a screening test, in our experience, an adequate response (GH level, ≥10 ng/mL) was observed in 90% of normal children who were given clonidine in a dose of 119 μg/sq m; with smaller doses (61.9 μg/sq m), only 64% of normal children had such a response. This would be in agreement with the data of Laron et al,1 who were also able to elicit an excellent GH response with a small dose of clonidine. The discrepancy between Drs Leheup and Pierson's data and our data