CONSANGUINITY AND HEREDITARY HEARING IMPAIRMENT AMONG SAUDI POPULATION

Hereditary sensorineural hearing loss is a preventive disease. A rando m sample survey of 6,421 Saudi infants and children was conducted to s tudy the prevalence of consanguineous marriage and its effect on the p revalence of hereditary sensorineural hearing loss. First cousin consa nguineous marriage was found among the parents of 21.1% of the childre n studied and second cousin consanguinity was present in 23%. The over all prevalence of hereditary sensorineural hearing loss was 1.7%. A hi gher prevalence of 2.8% of this type of deafness was found among child ren of first cousin parents, compared with 1.6% among children of more distant consanguinity and 1.4% among non-consanguineous families' chi ldren. The study showed that consanguinity is widely practiced among t he population surveyed and demonstrated a marked adverse effect on the incidence of hereditary sensorineural hearing impairment.