[Clinical and etiological data in 21 cases of Poland's syndrome]

Clinical and etiological data of 21 cases of Poland's syndrome are reported. The anomaly was seen especially on the right side and was significantly more frequent in males than in females (4:1). The variable expressivity of the morphology of the ipsilateral hand is analyzed. Height of the hand was obtained in 18 cases. Simian crease and Sydney line are significantly more frequent in patients than in controls. These observations confirmed that unilateral isolate absence of the pectoralis major muscle is a mild expression of the syndrome. Most of the cases were sporadic. No difference was found in the number of spontaneous abortions between the mothers of patients and controls. In one family, it seems that a mother-to-child transmissin was present which could be explain by an autosomal dominant inheritance.