Genetic Counselling & Personalised Medicine (AQA A Level Biology): Revision Note

Genetic counselling & personalised medicine

Genetic counselling

• Genetic screening can leave a patient or parent with many questions

• Genetic counsellors are commonly used to help individuals understand and process their results

  • The counsellors will read out the results and explain what they mean

• Counsellors can also be seen before a screening has occurred to inform an individual of the possible results

• They may discuss the following with a patient:

  • The chances of the individual developing an inherited disease

  • The lifestyle changes that can be made to reduce or manage the risk of developing the disease

  • Therapeutic treatments possible for the patient

  • The chance of an individual having a child with a certain disease

  • Termination of a pregnancy

  • Financial implications of having a child with severe disabilities

  • Ethical issues

Personalised medicine

• Personalised medicine involves the development of more targeted drugs to treat a variety of human diseases, as well as the development of synthetic tissues

• Information gathered from genome projects like the Human Genome Project (HGP) can be used to develop genomic medicine

  • Genomic medicine uses information about an individual's genes to influence their clinical care

• Genetic screening allows for individuals with a high chance of developing specific diseases to be identified and for preventative measures or precautions to be taken