Monday, September 10, 2012

Physician Error In 30 Percent Of DNA Tests

From Bloomberg, "Fumbled DNA Tests Mean Peril for Breast-Cancer Patients" by Robert Langreth:
ARUP Laboratories, a nonprofit laboratory affiliated with the University of Utah, found that 30 percent of orders for complex gene tests from February to December 2010 contained mistakes in handling by clinicians. Doctors requested the wrong test or mixed up rare diseases with similar names, or ordered a test for one cancer mutation when another ran in the family, said Christine Miller, an ARUP genetic counselor.

About 74 percent of internists said their knowledge of genetics was somewhat or very poor and 79 percent wanted more training on when to order the tests, according to a Columbia University study surveying 220 internists.

2 comments :

  1. While a lot of DNA contains information for a certain function, there is some called junk DNA, which is currently used for human identification. At some special locations in the junk DNA, predictable inheritance patterns were found to be useful in determining biological relationships.

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