CAUSES OF DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 



Prenatal Development Affected by Glandular Disturbances in the 

 Mother — Induced by Unfavorable Environment 



Max G. Schlapp 



Professor of Neuropathology in Post-Graduate Medical School and Hospital. 

 Director of Children's Court Clinic, New York City. 



(Photographs copyrighted by the Author.) 



RECENT studies of mentally de- 

 fective children and their moth- 

 ers have served to emphasize the 

 fact that prenatal pathological condi- 

 tions in the female parent are respon- 

 sible for certain definite malformations 

 in the child. These investigations have 

 thrown light upon the causation of 

 many obscure defects and deformities. 

 More specifically, they have proved, 

 for the first time, that to certain chemi- 

 cal imbalance in the blood of the 

 mother can be traced the cause of 

 many of the strange, monstrous unfor- 

 tunates who have been born into the 

 world and of whose peculiarities history 

 has defied any explanation outside the 

 realm of superstition. 



For some years we have understood, 

 from laboratory experiments on lower 

 animals, that the introduction of ex- 

 trinsic poisons into the female parent 

 will bring about weaknesses, abnormali- 

 ties and monstrosities in the offspring. 

 Notably is this the case where the 

 parent has been subjected to the toxic 

 effects of morphine, alcohol or the like. 

 But it is only now that we are begin- 

 ning to realize that internal factors 

 having to do with disturbances of the 

 ductless glands are the chief causes of 

 these mysterious malformations in chil- 

 dren. Indeed, such malformations have 

 heretofore been particularly bafffing in 

 view of the fact that the parents were, 

 in many cases, apparently healthy in- 

 dividuals who revealed none of the 

 stigmata so badly evident in the prog- 

 eny. 



At this point the reservation must be 

 noted that intrinsic toxins, such as re- 



sult from focal infections and infec- 

 tious diseases, play a subordinate part 

 in the prenatal history of the misbe- 

 gotten. This part is, however, sec- 

 ondary as well as subordinate, the 

 toxin most likely acting primarily upon 

 the endocrine organs of the mother, 

 which in the resulting pathological con- 

 dition, fail to do their part in the de- 

 velopment of the child. 



With the number of mental defect- 

 ives and deficients steadily mounting, 

 the economic situation ever becoming 

 more inimical to all weaker individuals, 

 and the burden of public charity strain- 

 ing the state purse, locating the source 

 of supply of the mentally handicapped 

 becomes of vital importance, not only 

 medically, but socially. An understand- 

 ing of the profound causes of these 

 conditions alone holds out the promise 

 of their treatment and correction; 

 namely, decreasing the begetting of 

 these individuals and the certainty that 

 many of them, notably the cretins, can 

 be normalized after birth must be wel- 

 comed as an addition of the first rank 

 to the sum of our medical and social 

 progress. 



The Causes of Abnormal 

 Development 



To understand the etiology, or the 

 general and specific causes of such dis- 

 turbances as are responsible for the 

 birth of mental defectives, we must go 

 back to the life processes of those 

 fundamental organisms, the living cells. 

 Of these processes there are only 

 three : the nutritive, the formative and 

 the functional. The nutritive process 



387 



