Avoid pregnancy rather than go through hazels of testing

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Parents of children with genetic conditions may avoid the need to choose whether to undergo pre-natal testing or to abort future pregnancies by simply avoiding subsequent pregnancy altogether, a study has observed.

Parents are 'choosing not to choose', researcher Dr Susan Kelly, who is based at the Egenis research centre at the University of Exeter, suggests, in a 'reflection of deep-seated ambivalence' about the options and the limitations of new reproductive technologies.

As per 'Choosing not to choose: reproductive responses of parents of children with genetic conditions or impairments' reported in the journal Sociology of Health and Illness, more than two-thirds of parents in the USA-based study chose not to have any more children rather than accepting tests to identify or avoid the birth of an affected child. Of the parents who did have further children, a majority chose not to make use of prenatal screening or testing.

"Prenatal testing procedures (to detect genetic conditions or fetal anomalies) were perceived by a number of parents as presenting rather than resolving risks," says Dr Kelly. "A number of parents rejected the possibility of being confronted with the choice of termination or continuation of an affected pregnancy".

The parents studied had children who were clients of a state-wide rural genetic outreach programme in the USA. A majority of parents still of childbearing age chose to avoid future pregnancies, or to decline prenatal testing for subsequent pregnancies. "These decisions do not reflect simple rejection of medical intervention, opposition to abortion, and/or affirmation of a positive parenting experience with an affected child," says Dr Kelly. "Rather, choosing to avoid the condition of choice may be a strategy of responsible parenting that emerges from ambivalence towards the options presented by reproductive technologies".

"The choices linked to prenatal screening and genetic testing practices were for most parents shaped by a heightened sense of the risks inherent in reproduction and of the limits of medicine's ability to predict and control them," says Dr Kelly.

"Faced with this set of choices, a number of parents chose to avoid future reproduction. A number of parents did not perceive the information they understood to be available from prenatal testing to be useful or relevant to their sense of responsibility and control. Experiencing the birth of an affected child for some parents exposed the limitations of medical knowledge and practice, and placed medicine alongside other forms of interpretation and evidence. Interventions such as genetic testing for a number of.

were linked to uncertainty and a loss of control for parents as responsible.

caretakers and decision makers".


Posted by: Emily    Source