Primary midline developmental field. II. Clinical/epidemiological analysis of alteration of laterality (normal body symmetry and asymmetry).

Lubinsky [Am J Med Genet 3:23-28, 1987] has suggested that the properties of the midline involve early determinative informational processes and are related to the midline's position and definition of the body's plane of symmetry. Opitz [Am J Med Genet 21:175-176, 1985, BD: OAS XXIX(1):3-37 1993] has pointed out that the laterality sequences represent a midline developmental field complex. Thus, bilateral left-sidedness (with asplenia) and bilateral right-sidedness (with asplenia) have been considered laterality sequences or syndromes if cause is known. Using the malformed infants registered by the Spanish Collaborative Study of Congenital Malformations (ECEMC), we performed a clinical/epidemiological analysis of the relationship between midline defects and alteration of normal body asymmetry and symmetry. The results support the assumption that both conditions could be consequence of disturbances in the midline primary developmental field.