Endocrine and Psychological Evaluation of Adopted Children
Public ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT00368043. Field values are reproduced from the official study page; the official ClinicalTrials.gov record remains the source of truth for eligibility, enrollment, and contact information.
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Official title
Biobehavioral Study of Recently Adopted Children
Brief summary
Reproduced verbatim from the official ClinicalTrials.gov record. Not medical advice.
The deleterious effects of institutionalized care on the health and growth and development of children have been described. Early studies have shown that the effects of institutionalized care on a child's growth and development may not be fully reversible. The exact mechanism through which these early stresses affect bio-behavioral outcomes has yet to be determined. A likely mechanism in which environmental influences could regulate both biological and psychosocial development may be through the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis (HPA). Recent advances in the area of brain research have enriched our understanding of the importance of early life experiences on physical, cognitive, developmental, mental and behavioral health outcomes. Children adopted from orphanages in countries as diverse as the former Soviet Union and Guatemala provide an opportunity to learn more about the effect of deprivation on neuro-endocrine function, physical growth, and developmental outcomes, including cognitive, and behavioral measures. This protocol proposes to study the changes of the HPA axis of the post-institutionalized adoptive child, ages 10 months to 4 years, which may help elucidate the etiology of the complex findings in this population. We will recruit 60 adopted children who experienced institutionalized care and were recently adopted by a US family and 60 controls. Our primary hypothesis is that a number of adopted children will have biochemical evidence of stress-induced activation of the HPA axis and sympathetic adrenal medullary system. HPA dysfunction will be evident by abnormal diurnal salivary cortisol levels, increased cortisol and/or catecholamine excretion in 24 hours urine measurements, and dysregulation of autonomic nervous system activity We also hypothesize that many of these responses will not normalize with time and that there will be a correlation between these responses and growth and behavioral disorders. In addition, we will examine nutritional intake and sleep patterns to determine their effect on growth and developmental outcome.
Study identification
- NCT ID
- NCT00368043
- Recruitment status
- Terminated
- Study type
- Observational
- Phase
- Not listed
- Lead sponsor
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)
- NIH
- Enrollment
- 38 participants
Conditions and interventions
Conditions
Interventions
Not listed
Eligibility (public fields only)
- Age range
- 10 Months to 4 Years
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Accepts healthy volunteers
This page does not interpret eligibility. Detailed inclusion and exclusion criteria are on the official ClinicalTrials.gov record.
Study timeline
- Start date
- Aug 17, 2006
- Primary completion
- Not listed
- Completion
- Mar 29, 2015
- Last update posted
- Dec 16, 2019
2006 – 2015
United States locations
- U.S. sites
- 1
- U.S. states
- 1
- U.S. cities
- 1
| Facility | City | State | ZIP | Site status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, 9000 Rockville Pike | Bethesda | Maryland | 20892 | — |
Site contact phone numbers, emails, and investigator names are intentionally not displayed here. Open the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for site contact information.
About this trial record page
- What this page shows
- Public field values for ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT00368043, including study identification, conditions, interventions, eligibility (age, sex, healthy volunteer), timeline, and U.S. site list.
- What this page does not do
- No medical advice, eligibility judgments, treatment recommendations, study quality scoring, or AI-generated medical summaries. No site contact phone numbers, emails, or investigator names.
- Where the data comes from
- Sourced from the official ClinicalTrials.gov public API. The official record is the source of truth.
- Last refresh
- Last update posted Dec 16, 2019 · Synced Sep 5, 2026
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Open the official record
The complete protocol, eligibility criteria, and contact information for NCT00368043 live on ClinicalTrials.gov.