Attitudes of genetic counselors towards expanding newborn screening and offering predictive genetic testing to children.

摘要

There is movement to expand newborn screening (NBS) to include conditions that challenge the traditional public health screening criteria. Little is known about the attitudes of genetic counselors towards expanding NBS and offering predictive genetic tests to children. For our study genetic counselors completed an internet survey posted on the National Society of Genetic Counselors Listserv regarding five conditions: cystic fibrosis (CF), Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency (G6PD), fragile X (FraX), and type 1 diabetes (T1D). The survey addressed attitudes towards: (1) testing high-risk infants; (2) mandatory NBS; (3) population screening beyond the newborn period; and (4) testing one's own child. Two hundred sixty-seven usable surveys were received. Over two-thirds of respondents supported testing high-risk infants for all conditions except T1D (22%). CF was the only condition for which there was majority support for both mandatory NBS (56%) and later population screening (60%). For all other conditions, later population screening was preferred over NBS (P