Aortic regurgitation and mitral valve prolapse with Down's syndrome: a case-control study.

This article focuses on a study that was designed to determine whether aortic regurgitation (AR) and mitral valve prolapse (MVP) are specifically associated with Down's syndrome, or occur in a comparably retarded population without Down's syndrome. The 92 control subjects had mental retardation attributable to low birth weight or perinatal asphyxia. In this case-control study, AR and MVP occurred about three times more often in institutionalized adults with Down's syndrome compared with those whose mental retardation was due to perinatal asphyxia or low birth weight. The low frequency of AR in both groups probably explains why the difference between the two groups did not achieve statistical significance.