Small stature sometimes becomes the cause of serious torment, especially for men. In most cases, we are talking about far-fetched psychological problems, but there are also cases when small stature is really a pathology.
The pathological option is considered to be an adult height of less than 130 cm for men and below 120 cm for women. Such people are called dwarfs, and their condition is called nanism, from the Greek word for "nanos" - "dwarf".
Reasons for nanism
A dwarf is a person who has stopped growing due to some kind of disease. Depending on the reasons that led to this condition, the accompanying symptoms also differ.
Growth arrest can occur due to a lack of growth hormone, a growth hormone produced by the anterior pituitary gland. In some patients, somatotropin is released in sufficient quantities, but body tissues do not respond to its effects. The cause of pituitary dwarfism can be a tumor of the pituitary system or other parts of the brain, birth trauma, bacterial and viral infections that hit the nervous system, and radiation exposure.
The physique of such a person may be proportional, but not always. There are dwarfs with a disproportionately large head, short limbs. In most cases, dwarfism is accompanied by sexual underdevelopment.
In some cases, pituitary insufficiency is accompanied by a lack of thyroid hormones, then dwarfism is combined with mental retardation, a predisposition to rickets and renal failure.
Lilliputians
Lilliputians should not be mixed with dwarfs. These are also people of very small stature - no more than 90 cm, but in them this pathology is caused not by acquired, but by congenital causes. In particular, their pituitary insufficiency is explained by a genetic mutation. Lilliputians are more likely than dwarfs to be proportionally folded. In their physique, they resemble five-year-old children.
Both dwarfs and midgets do not like to be called such terms, preferring the phrase "little people". It is not easy for such sick people to live, because their difference from ordinary people can arouse unhealthy curiosity in others.
And yet, little people often find themselves in circus art, theater or cinema. For example, the dwarf actor Vladimir Fedorov was remembered by the audience for the role of Chernomor in the film adaptation of Pushkin's poem Ruslan and Lyudmila, the dictator Turanchoks in the fantastic film Through Thorns to the Stars and many other roles in dramas and fairy tales. A brilliant career was made in Hollywood by the actor Warwick Ashley Davis, whose height is 107 cm. The most famous roles of Davis are the Leprechaun in the horror film of the same name, Professor Flitwick and the goblin Hookhook in the films about Harry Potter and the dwarf Nikabrik in the movie "Prince Caspian" from the series "The Chronicles Narnia ".
