Niemann-Pick disease: prenatal diagnoses and studies of sphingomyelinase activities

Five pregnancies were monitored for couples at-risk for having a child with some form of Niemann-Pick disease (NPD). Three of these were for the classic Type A form in which affected children usually have less than 1% of normal sphingomyelinase activity. Two of these pregnancies were terminated after the cultured amniotic-fluid cells were determined to have less than 1% of normal sphingomyelinase activity (0.4 and 0.6 nmole/mg protein/hr versus the control mean of 61.7). In the other pregnancy at risk for Type A NPD near normal activity was measured and it was continued to term. The two other pregnancies were monitored for couples in which severely affected children were found to have partially deficient sphingomyelinase activity (about 20% of normal) in cultured skin fibroblasts. Cultural amniotic-fluid cells from one of these pregnancies also had about 20% of control sphingomyelinase activity, but the woman underwent a spontaneous abortion soon after the cells were received and no studies on the fetus were done. The other sample was taken at the time of abortion for social reasons. In this case the cultured amniotic-fluid cells and cultured fetal skin fibroblasts gave normal sphingomyelinase activity. Enzymatic studies on tissues from the two fetuses predicted to be affected with Type A NPD confirmed the prenatal diagnosis. Studies of sphingomyelinase activity in the brains from these fetuses and from a child who died with Type A NPD indicated significant levels of activity when measured at pH 7.4 in the presence of magnesium. The higher level of the pH 7.4 sphingomyelinase activity in developing brain may indicate some important role in normal brain development.