Genetic Counseling

Do you need a Genetic Counseling

Genetic diseases, of which there are more than 2,000, affect 3 to 5 percent of all babies born in the United States. Sickel-cell anemia, phenyl-ketonuria (PKU), Tay Sachs disease, hemophilia, a type of muscular dystrophy, cystic fibrosis, Down’s syndrome, and two forms of diabetes are among the conditions that may be avoided through genetic counseling.

Parent naturally want to have healthy children, and most would prefer to know in advance if they are likely to pass on a serious disease to a child. For this reason, genetic counseling can be most valuable to a couple before they make the decision to have a child at all. People who are carriers of Tay-Sachs disease, for example, which condemns a child to an early death, may decide not to risk having children at all, less the children be afflicted with the disease.

A genetic counselor can explain to the prospective parents how a particular disorder is transmitted from generation to generation; what the odds are that the disease is slight, or if an effective treatment is available, parents may decide to go ahead with a pregnancy, despite the risks. Otherwise adoption ma be an alternative.

Some genetic disorder, unfortunately, cannot be identified before pregnancy, but many can be identified, while the fetus still in the mother’s uterus. It is now possible to test a developing fetus directly for about 100 genetic disorders as early as the fourth month of pregnancy. In the procedure called amniocentesis, a doctor can withdraw some of the amniotic fluid that surrounds a fetus in the womb. Laboratory test of the sloughed fetal cell contained in this fluid can then determine whether the fetus has one of these diseases.

Such tests are usually performed only if there is some reason to suspect that the unborn child may have a particular disease – that is, if the parent have already had one defective child or are known to be carriers of the babies. In the case of a few of these diseases, treatments can begin before birth. Otherwise the prospective parents have the option of considering a therapeutic abortion to prevent the birth of the defective baby.