Case#: 15-year-old female, F, Age of Report: 15 y.o., Ethnicity: From China.

CasePresentingHPOs: HP:0001511 (Intrauterine growth retardation/Intrauterine growth restriction), HP:0004322 (Short stature), HP:0000684 (Delayed eruption of teeth/teething delay), HP:0000858 (Irregular menstruation/irregular menstrual cycle), HP:0001007 (Hirsutism), HP:0000820 (Abnormality of the thyroid gland/thyroid disease), HP:0005328 (Progeroid facial appearance/Progeroid facial appearance), HP:0000545 (Myopia), HP:0000678 (Dental crowding/overcrowded teeth), HP:0000855 (Insulin resistance)

CaseHPOFreeText: Proband was noted to have "characteristic facial gestalts/"characteristic facial dysmorphim", low weight at birth,

The proband was admitted to our department due to irregular menstrual cycle and hirsutism with short stature, who had a history of intrauterine growth restriction and presented with short stature, teething delay, characteristic facial gestalts, hirsutism, and thyroid disease. Whole-exome sequencing and Sanger sequencing revealed c.1960C > T, a novel de novo nonsense mutation, leading to the termination of protein translation (p. Gln654*).

This is the first case report of SHORT syndrome complicated with thyroid disease in China, identifying a novel de novo heterozygous nonsense mutation in PIK3R1 gene (p. Gln654*).

The phenotypes are mildly different from other cases previously described in the literature, in which our patient presents with lipoatrophy, facial feature, and first reported thyroid disease. Thyroid disease may be a new clinical symptom of patients with SHORT syndrome.

The patient was a girl born to a physically healthy and non-consanguineous couple by spontaneous delivery at the 37th week. Birth weight was 2150 g (− 3.39SD) and birth length was 44 cm (− 3.41SD), indicating that the patient had intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR). The proband also had teething delay, getting the first tooth at 1 year old. During childhood, the patient was bothered by short stature. Psychomotor and speech development was normal. The height of proband’s father and mother was 168 cm and 155 cm respectively. The patient also had a healthy 20-month-old brother.

At the age of 15 years and 4 months, the proband was referred to our department due to irregular menstrual cycle and hirsutism with a height of 149 cm (− 2.04SD), weight of 43 kg (− 1.22SD) and body mass index (BMI) of 19.4 kg/m2. The height of the proband had remained 149 cm, ever since 13 years old. Physical examination showed a triangular-shaped face, small chin, large low-set ears, thin lip, downturned mouth, obvious beard and bushy eyebrows (Fig. 1a,b,c,d). Oral examination showed overcrowded and irregular teeth, hypodontia, and severe dental caries (Fig. 1g). Pubertal development was assessed according to the Tanner stage, with pubic hair at PH5 stage and breast at B2 stage. The second phalanx of little finger in the left hand was short and thicken, which was confirmed with X-ray (Fig. 1e,f). Ultrasound of neck showed diffuse thyroid disease. Ultrasound biomicroscopy of the eyes, examination of ocular fundus, abdominal ultrasound, reproductive system ultrasound, and chest X-ray were normal. The cranial magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) indicated a small posterior pituitary.

Not evaluated on the proband: OFC at birth, thin, wrinkled skin with readily visible veins, inguinal hernia,

CaseNotHPOs: N/A.

CaseNotHPOFreeText: Proband was noted to not have: Hyperextensibility of joints, ocular depression, Riegar anomaly, lipoatrophy, glaucoma, hyperopia, astigmatism, delayed bone age, intellectual deficiency, speech delay, diabetes, hearing loss, frequent infections, congenital heart diseases, pulmonary stenosis and ovarian cysts.

CasePreviousTesting: N/A.

CaseMethod1: N/A.

CaseMethod2: N/A.

CaseGenotypingMethod: Whole-exome sequencing and Sanger sequencing.

Variant: NM_181523.3:c.1960C>T (p.Gln654Ter).

ClinVar: N/A.

CAID: CA359884699.

gnomAD: N/A.

VariantEvidence: A novel de novo heterozygous nonsense mutation in the PIK3R1 gene (p. Gln654*) was found in the proband.

WES was performed to make a clear clinical diagnose. The candidate variants were first screened by a minor allele frequency < 3% against the 1000 Genomes Project, the NHLBI exome variant server or in 50 HapMap control exomes. Then, short stature, facial abnormalities were selected as the filtering clinical symptoms to analyze the screened candidate variants. According to the guidelines recommended by the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics, a pathogenic variant of PIK3R1 gene was identified to contribute to the patient’s conditions. Sequencing result indicated c.1960C > T of PIK3R1 gene a novel nonsense mutation, leading to the termination of protein translation (p. Gln654*), which was confirmed by sanger sequencing (Fig. 2). In addition, direct sequencing results showed the genotypes of proband’s parents were wild-type, suggesting it was a de novo mutation.

CaseAddInfo: The height of proband’s father and mother was 168 cm and 155 cm respectively. The patient also had a healthy 20-month-old brother.

CasePMIDs: N/A.