‘What are the chances of my passing this disease on to a daughter?’ a patient asks his doctor. At thirty-eight years old, Terri is pregnant for the first time after successfully battling endometriosis. A routine test— amniocentesis—has indicated she is carrying a girl. Terri fears that her child will suffer from the disease as she had.
Three weeks after doctor have diagnosed her case, a second patient says: “How did I get endometriosis? No one in my family has it but me.” Joan fervently wants to know why she has been “singled out” by this disease, since her sisters and mother are tree of it.
A third woman explains: “My mother was tortured by menstrual cramps and endometriosis until menopause. Through some miracle, I’m okay. She said I still could get it, too, that the real ‘curse’ is inheriting this kind of pain. Is my mother right?” Diana has been fortunate thus far, but she feels it’s just a matter of time before the first symptom of the disease becomes apparent.
Nearly all his patients with endometriosis routinely ask questions like these; in fact, such questions ate fundamental and make good sense. Could there be a strong hereditary component in a family’s gene pool that determines which of its women will or will not develop endometriosis? Pursuing a genetic link to this disease may provide one kind of clue to its cause, and that pursuit begins with the most basic question: Why me?
In continuing efforts to track down the cause of endometriosis, modern scientists have tended to concentrate on the physiology and chemistry of the disease. They have only just begun to examine the role of heredity more intensively. Specifically, they are looking for evidence of tendencies toward the disease among female relatives on both the maternal and paternal sides of a family. So far, the key to determining whether a woman will develop the disease lies in her inherited predisposition.
Not all genes establish absolutes, such as curly hair, brown eyes, or the shape of fingernails. Some genes set a range of possibility or susceptibility, not an absolute number or condition. You may be genetically predisposed to weight gain, but your actual weight can be environmentally determined by caloric intake, general health, and a combination of personal and regional attitudes about being overweight. A similar type of range applies to predispositions to diseases such as diabetes, cancer, and endometriosis; important genetic dues have recently been found to common mental disorders, too, including Alzheimer’s disease and manic-depressive illness.
Geneticists expect a simple test to be available in the future that will predict above average susceptibility to illnesses, both fatal and disabling, which no doubt could include genetic testing for endometriosis.
Imagine this: by the time such a genetic marker is found, not only could there be a cure for sufferers, but a preventive treatment might be available for those who would contract id For now, a conjunction of heredity and environmental factors for millions of women has resulted in endometriosis—but each woman, still has some control over the management and cure of the disease, despite her family history.
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