Cystic Fibrosis in a Black Woman
- Clifford W. Lober, MD;
- Hilliard F. Seigler, MD;
- Alexander Spock, MD
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
Excerpt
CYSTIC FIBROSIS is a genetic disease (autosomal recessive) considered to have a striking racial distribution. Kulczycki and Schauf1 estimated that this disease affects one of every 17,033 black newborns and is therefore 10 to 15 times less prevalent among black Americans than among white Americans. To our knowledge, there is only one report in the literature of cystic fibrosis in a black person over 20 years old.2
Report of a Case A 22-year-old unmarried black secretary was seen by one of us (H.F.S.) in November 1972. She complained of a persistent, dull, abdominal pain. Since early childhood, she had had recurrent, aching abdominal discomfort and foul-smelling, floating stools. Two or three episodes of rectal prolapse had been noted each year since age 10. Many of her frequent "chest colds" (approximately ten each year) were accompanied by trace hemoptysis (< 5 ml), but she had never experienced massive hemoptysis.
Footnotes
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Reprint requests to Department of Medicine, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN 55901 (Dr Lober).
