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Male Down Syndrome

Male Down Syndrome normally, at the time of conception a baby inherits genetic information from its parents in the form of 46 chromosomes: 23 from the mother and 23 from the father. In most cases of Down syndrome, a child gets an extra chromosome 21 — for a total of 47 chromosomes instead of 46. It's this extra genetic material that causes the physical features and developmental delays associated with DS. Although no one knows for sure why DS occurs and there's no way to prevent the chromosomal error that causes it, scientists do know that women age 35 and older have a significantly higher risk of having a child with the condition. At age 30, for example, a woman has about a 1 in 900 chance of conceiving a child with DS. Those odds increase to about 1 in 350 by age 35. By 40 the risk rises to about 1 in 100.

Male Down Syndrome with age, most likely because the overall incidence of genetic problems in their sperm increases with age. In fact the study found that half the cases of Down syndrome in children born to women older than thirty-five are likely to be sperm-related. We now also know that the father’s age affects the risk of miscarriage in women older than thirty five. The older the father, the higher the risk. The reason the male influence on Down syndrome (as well as other genetic and miscarriage) has not been recognized before is that the effect is complicated by the age of the female partner. When woman is younger that thirty-five, the age of the man does not seem to affect the overall risk of having a child with Down syndrome, where as when the woman is older than thirty-five, the age of the man has a pronounced effect.