Counseling in medical genetics / Sheldon Reed.

  • Sheldon Clark Reed
Date:
[1980]
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Credit: Counseling in medical genetics / Sheldon Reed. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Amniocentesis and Prenatal Diagnosis /53 The usual result of prenatal diagnosis is that the fetus is found to be unaffected and the relieved parents happily await the birth of the baby. Before prenatal diagnosis was developed, worried couples sometimes aborted the fetus without knowing whether it was affected or normal. Such needless abortions of normal fetuses can be prevented by using the amniocentesis technique. However, if an abortion is decided upon as a result of prenatal diagnostic data, the abortus must always be examined to confirm the prenatal findings. This is important both for monitoring the accuracy of the prenatal tests and for assuring the parents that the resuhs of the test were correct. Riccardi [1977] pointed out that, A clinician would be remiss — professionally, ethically, morally and legally — to deny a couple the opportunity to obtain information about the fetus or to implement a decision about continuing the pregnancy. Moral decisions about abortion must be made by the couple involved, not by the clinicians assisting them.
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