Risks of offspring of patients with patent ductus arteriosus.

Abstract

Congenital heart disease is a common form of congenital malformation with an incidence of about 5 per 1000 live births (Smithells,.1968; Renwick, 1968). Approximately 1000 of such lesions consist of patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) (Campbell, 1965; Nadas, 1963). In the majority of instances the aetiology is unknown. Some cases are associated with maternal rubella in the first trimester of preg- nancy, and often it is part of a complex cardiac mal- formation found in autosomal trisomies There have been several reports of more than one case occurring in a family, and Christiaens et al. ( Burman (1961) described a family with 4 affected members. It has been sug- gested that in some cases the lesion is inherited as a Mendelian dominant On the other hand, a higher incidence of parental con- sanguinity (Polani and Campbell, 1960) is sug- gestive of autosomal recessive or polygenic inheri- tance.