Kartagener's syndrome and the syndrome of immotile cilia

Abstract

Kartagener's syndrome (KS) is a hereditary disease with typical symptoms of situs inversus, bronchiectasis, and chronic infections of the nasal mucosa. Autosomal recessive inheritance cannot be doubted on account of repeated observations of affected sibs and parental cansanguinity. The bronchopulmonary symptoms in sibs, however, cannot be explained by this mode of inheritance. Recent clinical findings and electron microscope investigations suggest that KS is a special form of manifestation within the immotile cilia syndrome. This disease combines the typical bronchial and nasal symptoms of KS with sterility in the male due to immotile sperm tails and, as a facultative symptom, situs inversus. Thus, sibs with bronchiectasis but without situs inversus are also classified under this syndrome. The symptoms mentioned are caused by an abnormal morphology of bronchial cilia and sperm tails, which can be demonstrated by electron microscopy. The dynein arms normally attached to the nine microtubular doublets and providing a normal ciliary movement are lacking. It is assumed that during early embryonic life ciliary beats in the growing embryo determine the type of laterality. When ciliary movements are absent laterality may develop fortuitously, thus effecting a situs inversus in about half the affected cases. The numerical evaluation of pedigrees from the literature supports this assumption.