Regrets having prenatal blood screen

Orange County Register reporter Sarah Tully describes the anguish she felt as an expectant mother whose prenatal blood test “came back positive for Down syndrome.” She regretted taking the test.

Tully reports that she hadn’t really given the blood test much consideration before agreeing to have it done, and she had no idea what the test results meant. Learning that she had an elevated chance of having a child with Down syndrome sent her into an emotional tailspin. Although she subsequently learned that a “positive” result on the blood test didn’t necessarily mean her fetus was affected, her anxiety mounted.

After much worry, Tully and her husband decided to have an amniocentesis, a test with more than 99 percent accuracy that nonetheless carries a small risk of miscarriage. When she got the call notifying her that her fetus was not affected, Tully burst into tears.

… I couldn’t help think about how stressful the past few weeks had been. It all seemed unnecessary. I decided that, if I get pregnant again, I might get amniocentesis to find out for sure. But I’ll never do a screening test again.

The story is accompanied by a glossary of prenatal screens and tests.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 26th, 2008 at 4:48 am and is filed under Down syndrome, NOT2BEMISSED, News_2_Use, abortion, commentary, first-person, genetics, marriage, medicine, prenatal diagnosis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.  Email This Post