ABSTRACT
I. HISTORY, CHARACTERISTICS, AND EPIDEMIOLOGY In 1841 Alfred Poland described a case of a deficient pectoralis major muscle in association with syndactyly of the ipsilateral hand (I). Clarkson, a hand surgeon, named the syndrome Poland's syndrome after treating a patient with the hand anomalies originally described by Poland (2). The disorder was probably originally reported by Lallemand in 1826 when he described the chest wall deformity that we now associate with Poland's syndrome (3). Poland's syndrome consists of a variable constellation of findings that must include congenital absence of the sternal head of the pectoralis major muscle (4). It may also include one or more of the following anomalies (Fig. 1).
