[Genetic aspects of heart lesions in patients with chronic alcoholism]

Parents and their children from 40 families of the first generation and 38 families of the second generation were examined genetically for catalase activity in the serum. It was found that children of the first generation suffered from chronic alcoholism more frequently in the families in which either mother or both parents abused alcohol. Low activity of serum catalase occurred in those children of the second generation, whose both parents were chronic alcoholics and had low catalase activity, especially of their mother. If the son was a chronic alcoholic, the inheritance of low catalase activity from his mother caused alcoholic damage to the heart. The risk was still higher in the second generation, especially in girls because of X-chromosome effect.