A Safer Test for Down’s Syndrome

A NEW blood test could take the risks out of prenatal checks for hereditary conditions such as Down’s syndrome and cystic fibrosis.

The AmpliGrid method, developed by Advalytix, uses special technology to analyse single foetal cells from a sample of the mother’s blood.

Its developers say conditions can be diagnosed with the same accuracy as amniocentesis, but without danger to mother or baby.

Amniocentesis, which involves taking a sample of the fluid surrounding the unborn baby, is used to detect both conditions, but it carries a risk of miscarriage in up to one in 100 cases. The risk is higher for chorionic villus sampling, where tissue from the placenta is taken for further analysis.

Although foetal cells are present in maternal blood and carry all the genetic material needed to detect disorders, until now it has proved difficult to target them through blood tests maternal and foetal genetic material tends to get mixed up when samples are taken.

‘As a result, diagnosis of hereditary diseases is riskfree for both mother and foetus,’ says the company, which is working with the Medical University of Graz in Germany. The company expects to market the test in about two years..

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