Clinical Information

Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), with an incidence rate of 1 in 10,000 to 18,000 live births, is one of the most common inherited syndromes. The condition is characterized by impaired cortisol production due to inherited defects in steroid biosynthesis. The clinical consequences of CAH, besides diminished cortisol production, depend on which enzyme is affected and whether the loss of function is partial or complete.

In greater than 90% of CAH cases, the affected enzyme is 21-steroid hydroxylase, encoded by the CYP21A2 gene located on chromosome 6 within the highly recombinant human histocompatibility complex locus. 21-hydroxylase deficient CAH is inherited in an autosomal recessive pattern and has a spectrum of clinical phenotypes depending upon residual enzyme activity. Excessive adrenal androgen biosynthesis results in varying degrees of virilization. If there is some residual enzyme activity, a non-classical phenotype results, with signs of hyperandrogenism typically starting in later childhood or adolescence. Individuals with severe enzyme deficiency have classical CAH, with prenatal onset of virilization. Classical CAH is subdivided into simple-virilizing (minimal residual enzyme activity) and salt-wasting (no residual enzyme activity) forms. Patients with salt-wasting CAH have both cortisol and mineral corticosteroid deficiency and are at risk for life-threatening salt-wasting crises if untreated.

Because of its high incidence rate, 21-hydroxylase deficiency is screened for in most US newborn screening programs, typically by measuring 17-hydroxyprogesterone concentrations in blood spots by immunoassay. Confirmation by other testing strategies (eg, liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry: LC-MS/MS), CAH2T / Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia Newborn Screen, Blood Spot), or retesting after several weeks, is required for most positive screens because of the high false-positive rates of the immunoassays (due to physiological elevations of 17-hydroxyprogesterone in premature babies and immunoassay cross-reactivity with other steroids). In a small percentage of cases, additional testing will fail to provide a definitive diagnosis. In addition, screening strategies can miss many non-classical cases, which may present later in childhood or adolescence and require more extensive steroid hormone profiling, including testing before and after adrenal stimulation with adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH)-1-24.

For these reasons, genetic diagnosis plays an important ancillary role in both classical and nonclassical cases. In addition, the high carrier frequency (approximately 1 in 50) for CYP21A2 variant makes genetic diagnosis important for genetic counseling. Genetic testing can also play a role in prenatal diagnosis of 21-hydroxylase deficiency. However, accurate genetic diagnosis continues to be a challenge because most of the variants arise from recombination events between CYP21A2 and its highly homologous pseudogene, CYP21A1P (transcriptionally inactive). In particular, partial or complex rearrangements (with or without accompanying gene duplication events), which lead to reciprocal exchanges between gene and pseudogene, can present severe diagnostic challenges. Comprehensive genetic testing strategies must therefore allow accurate assessment of most, or all, known rearrangements and variants, as well as unequivocal determination of whether the observed changes are located within a potentially transcriptionally active genetic segment. Testing of additional family members is often needed for clarification of genetic test results.