What Is Patau's Syndrome?

Patau's syndrome is a rare chromosome abnormality. Normally a baby inherits 23 half chromosones from each parent (for a total of 23 pairs). But in Patau's syndrome, there's an extra copy of chromosone 13 (so 3 rather than the usual 2 copies of it). This means that Patau's syndrome is also known as trisomy-13. It occurs in about one in 5,000 births. It can be detected antenally using invasive tests such as amniocentisis. The risk goes up with maternal age, from about .02% of live births at age 35 to 2.1% of live births at age 42.

Patau's syndrome can cause a lot of different disabilities and medical problems, most of them severe. Almost any organ of the body may be affected, especially the heart, brain, face, palate, eyes, hands, limbs and genitalia.

Many children with this condition die within a few days of birth, and very few live beyond age 3 years.

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