Steele M W, Rosser L, Rodnan J B, Bryce M
Clin Genet. 1986 Oct;30(4):328-34. doi: 10.1111/j.1399-0004.1986.tb00615.x.
We compared the reproductive behavior of 132 white married couples of whom 44 had a child with cystic fibrosis, 44 with either Down Syndrome or neural tube defect, and 44 with cerebral palsy to that of the general USA white married population. The three groups of couples were similar respecting race, religion, maternal age, parental occupation and education, and sex of affected child. Most couples had received some genetic counseling and all were followed for at least 3 years after diagnosis of the affected child. Regardless of the degree of recurrent risk and availability or not of prenatal diagnosis, couples were several fold more likely to reproduce again when the affected child was the 1st rather than later born. From this study and others, we conclude that the three major determinators of reproductive behavior in couples after having a genetically handicapped child are the same as those for the general population. Specifically, these are: parental desire for children, past reproductive experiences (that is, sibship size and perhaps also outcome), and maternal age.
我们将132对白人已婚夫妇的生育行为与美国白人已婚普通人群进行了比较。这132对夫妇中，44对夫妇的孩子患有囊性纤维化，44对夫妇的孩子患有唐氏综合征或神经管缺陷，44对夫妇的孩子患有脑瘫。这三组夫妇在种族、宗教、母亲年龄、父母职业和教育程度以及患病孩子的性别方面相似。大多数夫妇都接受过一些遗传咨询，并且在确诊患病孩子后均被随访至少3年。无论复发风险程度如何以及是否有产前诊断，当患病孩子是头胎而非后出生的孩子时，夫妇再次生育的可能性要高出几倍。从这项研究及其他研究中，我们得出结论，夫妇在生育了患有遗传缺陷的孩子后的生育行为的三个主要决定因素与普通人群相同。具体而言，这些因素是：父母对孩子的渴望、过去的生育经历（即同胞数量以及可能还有生育结果）和母亲年龄。
