by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.
A lady asked:
To have Large Vestibular Aqueduct Syndrome (LVAS), both parents have to have the gene, right? And their parents before them have had to have the gene? I come from a big family, and no other relative has had a hearing issue. If it is inherited, I would think you would see it more in the family history. I’ve started to tell family members about my son’s diagnosis and that it is an inherited gene. They look at me like I have lost my mind! They all say they don’t know of anyone that has a hearing problem in the family.
First, remember this is a recessive trait—so yes, both parents have to have at least one gene of the gene pair to give the child LVAS. However, one parent could have one gene from one of their parents who could have one gene from one of their parents, etc., and LVAS would never show up until finally someone in the family (in this case you) married a person who also carried the LVAS gene.
Second, your son has a mild to moderate hearing loss. Maybe there really are some in your family that also have LVAS but have such a mild hearing loss no one was ever aware of it.
Third, we don’t have a clue how many people are walking around with LVAS and never have a hearing loss—we only know some of those that do have the hearing loss. Until they test the general population for LVAS, they’ll never have a handle on just how often it causes hearing loss vs. not causing hearing loss.
Thus, there are 3 possibilities why your son has LVAS (which is passed genetically) and a hearing loss although it doesn’t appear to be in your family.
This mother concluded, “I’m beginning to believe that I caused my son’s hearing loss because of something I did,”
You are right. You did! You married his father didn’t you? But that wasn’t a bad thing, was it?
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