Men With MS More Likely To Pass It On
FROM: Ivanhoe Newswire

A new study reveals men with multiple sclerosis transmit the disease
to their children twice as often as women do. Researchers from the
Mayo Clinic, the University of California at San Francisco, the
University of California at Berkeley, and Kaiser Permanente studied
441 children who had either a mother or father with MS. They found
fathers with MS pass the disease to their children 2.2-times more
often than women. The authors theorize men may have a
greater "genetic load" of MS genes. "The hypothesis of the study is
that men are more resistant to MS, so they need stronger or a larger
number of genes in order to develop MS and then pass these genes to
their children," writes lead author Orhun Kantarci, M.D., Mayo Clinic
neurologist. Kantarci adds neither hormonal differences between men
and women nor genes on the sex chromosomes easily explain the
findings. The authors say the results are primarily of interest to
scientists studying the mechanisms of genetic transmission and should
not change how doctors counsel men with MS about the risk to their
offspring.