A Pilot Study of Fragile X Syndrome Screening in Pregnant Women and Women Planning Pregnancy: Implementation, Acceptance, Awareness, and Geographic Factors.

We report herein results of a study performed in the Balearic Islands which had the following goals: 1) Determine the proportion of pregnant or non-pregnant women planning pregnancy, who would choose to undergo a screening test for Fragile X Syndrome (FXS), if it is accompanied by the appropriate information; 2) Assess satisfaction and any increase in stress among women who participate in screening; 3) Collect epidemiological information about the incidence of the disease in our population; and 4) Collect demographic and health history data and assess participants' awareness of the disease. Screening was performed on 3,731 pregnant and non-pregnant women of childbearing age and the results indicate: a very high voluntary rate of participation; a high level of self-reported satisfaction and low levels of stress because of the test; a very high incidence of premutation (1/106) in our population; and a low level of awareness about the existence of FXS (25 %). Additional findings indicate no significant correlation between self-reported health history and premutation detection, and the high premutation incidence does not seem to be specific to the indigenous Balearic population. Based on these results, we discuss the pros and cons of an implementation of preconception and pregnant women screening for FXS within a public health screening program.

Spontaneous repigmentation of silvery hair in an infant with congenital hydrops fetalis and hypoproteinemia.

Silvery hair is a characteristic finding of 3 rare autosomal recessive disorders: Chédiak-Higashi syndrome (CHS), Elejalde syndrome (ES), and Griscelli syndrome (GS). We report the case of a 2-month-old male infant with transient silvery hair and generalized hypopigmentation of the skin and eyes who did not have one of these classic causative disorders. The patient was delivered at 35 weeks' gestation with congenital hydrops fetalis associated with a chromosomal abnormality (46,XY,add[2],[p23]), hypothyroidism, hypoproteinemia, and hypogammaglobulinemia. Over the course of follow-up, spontaneous brown repigmentation of the silvery hair was noted. We concluded that the silvery hair was induced by hypoproteinemia secondary to congenital hydrops fetalis.

Fragile X syndrome screening in pregnant women and women planning pregnancy shows a remarkably high FMR1 premutation prevalence in the Balearic Islands.

There are no reported studies to determine incidence of Fragile X Syndrome (FXS) in women within the Spanish population. For this reason, together with the high incidence of FXS in the general population, the exclusively maternal expansion, the familial and social impact of the syndrome, and the ease of use and level of detection of current PCR-based techniques, we have conducted a population-based screening pilot program of which we present here the molecular results. We typed prospectively 3,413 pregnant and 318 non-pregnant women and found a prevalence of premutation (PM) carriers of 1 in 106, which is the highest described to date in any population. We also found 230 different alleles of which the most frequent are 10A9A9 (38.4%), 9A9A9 (15.1%), and 10A9 (10.5%). Furthermore, alleles with 0 AGG interruptions or with a pure (uninterrupted) CGG repeat run larger than 34 (presumably more unstable), were more frequent among PM alleles compared to normal alleles. Theà unexpected high frequency of expanded PM alleles in females in the general population makes a very compelling argument for the need for prenatal or preconceptional FXS screening in our community. Furthermore, we find FMR1 triplet primed PCR (TP-PCR) confidently and precisely determines sizes for both alleles of the CGG repeat in women and offers AGG information which greatly improves CGG expansion risk estimations for genetic counselling. Thus, TP-PCR is an informative, efficient and robust method for FXS screening in the female population. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.