The latest in chronological order is the designer Roberto Cavalli, who welcomes the birth of his sixth child at the age of 82. Before him Richard Gere, Robert De Niro, Clint Eastwood and many others. Men who become fathers after the age of 60-70. Usually, the age of the mother ends under the magnifying glass: every woman knows that after the age of 35 the risk that the fetus may have health problems increases and concern is almost always accompanied by specific prenatal diagnostic tests. But what do we know about “elderly” fatherhood?
Male ovules and gametes: how does their life process change?
Is a child born from the sperm of a 60- or 70-year-old at greater risk than one born from the gamete of a younger man? «There is a lot of talk about maternal age and less about that of man, which nonetheless has significant importance. Women have a number of ovules destined to end at a certain point in their life, a number that does not renew itself,” he explains Francesco Brancati, professor of medical genetics at the University of L’Aquila. «Male gametes, on the other hand, renew themselves periodically and potentially for life. But this does not exclude risks for genetic pathologies that correlate with the paternal age ».
Becoming a dad after the age of 60-70: what are the risks for the child?
As demonstrated by many scientific studies, there is a correlation between advanced maternal age and the increase in fetal pathologies linked to the number of chromosomes (in particular, down syndrome). “The advanced age of the father, on the other hand, is related to the risk of other diseases, which do not mainly concern the number of chromosomes, but the changes of the DNA letters in a single gene, the mutations”, continues the expert.
“Let’s talk about rare, very rare or ultra rare monogenic diseases. They can be of different nature: some forms are better known, such as specific form of dwarfism or craniostenosis, others are less well known». But, «unlike women, men’s is a linear correlation which, as research confirms, we can observe throughout the entire reproductive life. The rate of “spontaneous” mutation, the letter that changes in the DNA, increases in spermatozoa with increasing age. In addition, some DNA mutations give sperm a “growth advantage”, so their rate increases in these cells.
Why is there no perception of risk?
However, the perception is that only women are concerned about conceiving a child at an older age. Why, despite the fact that an elderly father is not a guarantee of health, do men not worry about having children even after the age of 60-70? «The fact is that attention tends to be focused on the best-known and well-known things», explains Brancati, «and we traditionally we have diagnostic prenatal exams available for pathologies related to advanced maternal age because, as in the case of trisomy 21, they are more frequent”. Amniocentesis e CVSwhich women resort to in old age, are used in daily practice to diagnose pathologies such as trisomy 21 and others related to the number of chromosomes.
Prenatal diagnostic tools
As far as pathologies related to the father’s advanced age are concerned, we cannot say that there are no diagnostic tools, but they are certainly more complicated. There is a tendency to speak of prenatal examination in terms of the type of sampling (in amniocentesis the amniotic fluid is taken from the uterine cavity, while in CVS a small amount of tissue is aspirated from the chorionic villi), but there should be more attention on the type of investigation genetics that is performed on the material taken with these methods.
This should be the subject of a prenatal genetic counseling. Advice which, however, is not always guaranteed. “However, it must be said”, concludes the expert, “that the pathologies caused by mutations in disease genes can be many – even if singularly rare – and prenatal diagnosis cannot focus on identifying all the possible illnesses. Also because the dominant pathologies we are talking about are very variable and it is not always possible to attribute a precise clinical significance to a DNA variant”.