Paper
Intraventricular hemorrhage, necrotizing enterocolitis, and bronchopulmonary dysplasia remain significant causes of morbidity and mortality in preterm newborns.Our goal was to assess the familial and genetic susceptibility to intraventricular hemorrhage, necrotizing enterocolitis, and bronchopulmonary dysplasia.Mixed-effects logistic-regression and latent variable probit model analysis were used to assess the contribution of several covariates in a multicenter retrospective study of 450 twin pairs born at or =1 affected member had both members affected versus 3.69 expected. After controlling for covariates, genetic factors accounted for 53% of the variance in liability for bronchopulmonary dysplasia.Twin analyses show that intraventricular hemorrhage, necrotizing enterocolitis, and bronchopulmonary dysplasia are familial in origin. These data demonstrate, for the first time, the significant genetic susceptibility for bronchopulmonary dysplasia in preterm infants.