EVIDENCE FOR ACCELERATED SKIN WRINKLING AMONG DEVELOPMENTALLY DELAYEDINDIVIDUALS WITH DOWNS-SYNDROME

Down's Syndrome (DS) is a genetic disorder involving mental retardatio n which is reported to be a condition of accelerated aging. However, f ew studies exist which examine age-dependent changes in DS and these s tudies fail to include a control group. In the present study a non-inv asive, painless, and easily obtainable measure reflecting age-dependen t topographical changes of the skin (skin wrinkling) was obtained in 1 5 DS subjects, 14 developmentally disabled (DD) (mentally retarded) co ntrols (DD controls) and 16 healthy controls of similar ages ranging f rom 22 to 51 years. The healthy control group failed to show correlati ons of skin measures with age, as predicted for the age-range of these subjects, based on results of previous studies. However, the DS group showed significant correlations of all skin measures from relatively non-sunexposed and sunexposed skin sites, with age. The DD control als o showed significant correlations with age of several but not all skin sites and the correlation coefficients tended to be less than that of the DS; at least, when contrasted with the healthy controls the DS sh owed greater values of several skin measures suggestive of accelerated skin wrinkling. These results provide evidence for accelerated aging of the skin, and possibly greater effects of sunexposure on skin wrink ling, in DS and possibly (DD) individuals in contrast to healthy indiv iduals without a genetic disorder and without mental retardation.