IL CONCETTO DI MULTIFATTORIALITA NELLA GENESI DELLE LABIOPALATOSCHISI

Many congenital malformations, such as cleft palate and cleft lip, have a multifactorial origin involving both environmental and genetic factors. Conditions such as these may be exclusively monogenic, polygenic or environmental, but in most cases both genetic and environmental factors are involved. In this paper the authors try to point out the attention about the teratogenic effects of the main environmental factors involved in the genesis of cleft lip and palate and describe the current concepts about the multifactorial threshold model in relation to it.