SPONASTRIME dysplasia: report on a female patient with severe skeletal changes.

We report on a 6-year-old girl with SPONASTRIME dysplasia, characterized by short-limbed dwarfism, a relatively large head, midfacial hypoplasia, a saddle nose, moderate deformities of the vertebral bodies, striated metaphyses, and normal intelligence. She showed severe skeletal changes including marked delay of epiphyseal ossification, evident metaphyseal dysplasia, and osteopathia striata more pronounced than in most of the previously reported patients with this disorder. The patient we describe and a male patient reported by Camera et al. [1994: Pediatr Radiol 24:322-324] are likely to represent the severely-affected end of the clinical spectrum of the disorder. These finding thus rule out the X-linked mode of inheritance of the disorder proposed by Camera et al. [1994: Pediatr Radiol 24: 322-324]. Alternatively, the two severely-affected patients may represent a variant form of the disorder. There is evidence that SPONASTRIME dysplasia is a genetically heterogeneous disorder.