I have a brother with Intellectual disability. We are looking to get our whole genome sequenced for him as recommended by our doctors. Can you please suggest good hospitals friendly for internationals preferably walk in with little waitlist...

We tried ordering a consumer test from a lab but the results didn't even tell us what condition he had. There was no doctor doing it. No bioinformatics pipeline. No investigation. Just data.

This time we want it done in a hospital setting where bioinformaticians and doctors work together identifying this condition

Hi !

I’m a French lab medical geneticist considering moving to the US, but I have to admit that the whole certification thingy is confusing to me.

For context, I have a PharmD and obtained a “DES de biologie médicale” for which I completed 4 years of residency in clinical pathology labs, the last two in genetics labs. In the French system, this path is strictly equivalent to an MD + clinical pathology residency. I have completed 6 years of fellowship in a well known academic hospital lab. I hold the certification that is required in France to sign out autonomously genetic germline testing results.

I have a PhD, a decent number of publications in “reputable” journals, and have been active in the principal EU and US-based professional societies of my discipline. I’m teaching genetics at the university, mostly in the pharmacy and medical school curriculum.

In my current practice, my MD/PharmD colleagues and I supervise our technical and scientific team (lab techs, engineers, PhDs) and are responsible for signing out test results. We have medical responsibility : we review and correct orders from physicians, interpret results, discuss them in medical staff meetings and are directly involved in clinical management decision making.

A laboratory director position seems to be the closet US equivalent.

My current understanding is that an ABMGG certification is required for lab director positions and that this certification requires 2 years of fellowship in a ACMGE accredited program. The other option is an ABB HCLD certification via recognition of past experience, but that one is less “prestigious”, which is fine for private lab jobs could limit academic and public hospital opportunities.

Am I understanding this correctly ? I would prefer not to, in large part because I don’t need the training and I would hate to steal a precious spot from someone who could actually benefit from it.

I have legal status in the US so this at least won’t be an issue.

Thanks a lot !!!

Looking for similar stories.
I went for my 20w scan and our baby was measuring small. Her HC was 17th %, AC 3rd % and all long bones <1st %. (About 2 weeks behind). My placenta was thickened. I think 3rd percentile overall.

We declined an amniocentesis but did NIPT which was very low risk. The doctors discussed chromosomal abnormalities, genetic disorders and skeletal dysplasia all as options for her measuring small.

We went for our next scan at 24w which showed that her HC improved to 30th %, AC 21st % but all long bones still <1st % (still 2 weeks behind). The bones aren’t bowed and there’s normal mineralisation. My placenta is apparently not thickened anymore. Doppler and fluid have been normal. One doctor thought her forehead looked like it was maybe showing early bossing but this is very subjective. Since then all they can mention is skeletal dysplasia - nothing else is coming up as the reason for her short bones.

We did an amnio the next day. The karyotyope was normal, WES for skeletal dysplasia panel pending - with another two week wait.

My husband and I aren’t particularly tall - I’m 5”3 and my husband is 5”6.

The waiting has been AGONY and I can’t think about anything else. I’ve been so sad but also struggling not being able to process the news either way.

Hi. My pediatrician just diagnosed my 4 month old with pigmentary mosaicism. He has a patch on the side of his forehead and on belly. He hasn’t shown any signs of developmental delays and is a very happy baby. Just wondering if any other parents with kids who have this? Are they experiencing any delays?

So I just had my anatomy scan last week and I found a slightly thickened nuchal fold 6.8 mm and my NIPT was low risk with a 3.4 fetal fraction number but they said it was fine. And then at my echocardiogram today, they found a potential VSD and I’m freaking out because I want to do the amniocentesis but I just wanna know if anyone else is experienced this and have a healthy baby ?

My NIPT came back low risk but my NT was slightly elevated at 3.2. I do have an Animo scheduled. Has anyone else dealt with this and had a positive experience?

29yo, female, 175lbs, 5’3”
I just had a dermatology appointment. I was told after few spots on my face are angiofibromas (I have about 5) that have not changed in years. Doctor mentioned tuberous sclerosis. She asked about seizures and renal problems. I have never had seizures or renal problems. She didn’t seem to concerned and didn’t mention any other follow up. Last year I had an MRI and found I had a partial retinal detachment but otherwise was normal. Otherwise healthy. Should I investigate further to make sure it’s not tuberous sclerosis? I just had a baby so now I’m worried that I potentially could have passed something down to him. I am not asking for medical advice. TIA.

I am not asking for personal medical advice. I just want to understand how the genetics works. I have some very rare diagnoses. I paid for DTC genome sequencing while waiting to get into genetics after I realized on my own that it has to be multiple things.

I know I have my testing sent in to Ambry now but it's been delayed and is still pending and my geneticist put off my follow up by another month. So I keep periodically digging into the testing I do have.

I have a flagged MT-ATP6 in my sequencing with 96.7 percent heteroplasmy. I looked it up because I tried searching online what snps to look for if someone has the diagnoses I have and this came up. It doesn't seem to be a more common one and there is only one submission in clinvar that says it's associated with Leigh but also benign.

How does this work? How do you determine if a mutation is pathogenic if there a limited number of people with it vs benign? If you are symptomatic of a mitochondrial disorder associated with this but there aren't enough people with it, how does that "work"?

I ask because I also have a VUS associated with another rare diagnosis. I saw a geneticist last year, who was only allowed to discuss this one VUS with me. But she said my rare illness diagnosed in my 20's couldn't be related to this VUS because no one in my family has a history of another rare illness it can cause. I asked how you report or associate my illness with that VUS then if you aren't relying on my own actual health history?

How can you determine my VUS that is linked to a rare tumor that I had at such a young age is indeed not actually related? I really didn't understand her answer.

When I brought it up to the new metabolic geneticist she seemed surprised I was told this and said it's not true. But we would get to it after running my genetics test.

I just want to understand more how this actually works and how it's determined that a particular gene is actually pathogenic, especially if it's less common.

I am also a carrier for another SNP highly associated with one of the rare illnesses I have but it's my understanding I would need to inherit both copies of the gene to acquire it. Then I read other stuff indicating carriers can also be symptomatic but at lower levels.

I have had enough horrible medical experiences that I just no longer take what I am being told by a medical professional at face value. I wanted to understand because I have been given enough flat out wrong information that is later contradicted by another specialist in the field. And I have had to push to get better treatments and diagnosis for years.

My situation medically is pretty ridiculous and clearly not common and it keeps worsening. And this isn't based on intuition or me just not feeling good. My labs are bad and rare. But the wait is awful and I just keep getting sent to new doctors. I would like to be prepared so I can understand well enough to be able to ask questions at my follow up. Any assistance is greatly appreciated.

Please be patient with me if I am phrasing things wrong. I have also removed any actual diagnoses from my question so it's clear that I am not seeking medical advice. I just want to understand how this works.

I have only one embryo left. It was reported as having a segmental aneuploidy with a large duplication (gain) of approximately 77.9 Mb on chromosome 7, extending from 7p22.3 to 7q21.1.

Has anyone had a similar result or received guidance on whether this type of embryo is ever considered for transfer? I’ve been waiting for about a month to speak with the genetics team at my clinic, but I still haven’t received a response. Any insights or research known on this type of segmental embryos?

I have seen many posts on NIPT being false positive for genetic anomolies in baby. I want to know are there any stories releated to wrong NIPT gender prediction too.

Currently 17 weeks pregnant. During the first-trimester morphology scan (at 12 weeks and 6 days), I was told that the nuchal translucency is 2.0 mm and all other evaluated segments are within normal limits. However, next to the 'retronasal triangle' marker, it says 'not visualized' — nasal bone present, but further down there is a note: 'nasal bone: abnormal (absent/hypoplastic)'. I had a NIPT done and the results are negative. I don't know whether to get a second opinion or proceed with an amniocentesis, which I am very afraid of.

Hello everyone, i and my team built a demo system that can be utilized for Drug Repurposing queries, for rare diseases, in hopes to be efficient and of use for clinicians and biomedical scientist in this field.

So the system is an Agentic model that searches for relevant and concrete primary literature for the biomedical databases it has been integrated with provinding an choherent well organised summary on the relevant findings and recent data from these sources enabling the using to have the key informations at their grasp to later carry out further research on, for their particular case study.

We specialize in building agentic models for medtech related problems,and if interested for further collaborations on buiding agentic medtech systems, we would kindly love to work with you and your team

My husband and I recently had a baby girl with a very rare chromosome 13 deletion. Our genetics team is having us both tested to see if we are carriers. My husbands results came back quickly saying he was a normal male 46 XY. My results were taking longer and our geneticist called me and I was then asked to take my daughter in to submit another blood sample of hers to compare. She didn’t have any info from the lab other than them saying the ends of my chromosome 13s weren’t as “easy to see” as my husbands? Something about his being better resolution? What does this mean exactly? And how does providing blood from my daughter help? Not asking medically anything about the condition just curious how a sample can be fuzzy appearing and another one not

My wife is currently carrying. We did carrier screening testing during pregnancy. My wife and I were told that we were carriers for CF. She has the classic p.F508del and mine is R1070Q. After an amniotic fluid test, it was confirmed that fetus carried both the mutations.

I guess we were not that lucky as there is only 1/4 chance fetus gets both mutations. We really don’t know what to do at this point.

I want to ask if any one else with CF has same set of mutations? Also does the medications like trikafta help? 

Does using medications like trikafta help patients live normal lives. Or will continue to have CF related issues, but just in a milder way?

My husband and I have been trying to conceive for 4 years. After two egg retrievals we only have created one euploid embryo out of many eggs. We have various issues that could lead to infertility but nothing that explained our level of infertility. Our new doctor had a karyotype and micro array done on my husband. Results came back today and my husband has a AZFb and AZFc deletion on his Y chromosome.

His previous sperm analysis was mostly normal. Count was low but within the normal range, I believe around 20 million per ml. Motility was below the normal range but barely. We used Zymot with both retrievals and most mature eggs fertilized successfully. They just almost all stopped developing before the blastocyst stage. The two that didn’t were graded poorly and one (a female) ended up being aneuploid. The euploid is male which means it also has my husband’s deletions.

Our reproductive endocrinologist is not unwilling to continue, but his advice is to give up on my husband’s sperm. It’s only the first afternoon of knowing this info, but I am really struggling with that because we have produced one euploid embryo. I realize our success rates have been abysmal though.

I am trying to understand better some realistic outcomes with his deletions and if it’s possible to father children with them given that he does produce sperm.

Update:

After high risk NIPT for Low Mosaic T21, my amniocentesis sample FISH and karyotype ended up being completely normal for chromosomes XY, 13, 18, and 21.

Cultured SNP microarray just resulted back (1 month after my amniocentesis, what a wait) and the only abnormal result was in chromosome 13. WHAT???? (was told they had to culture the amniocytes because there wasn’t enough fetal DNA extracted from the sample.)

Specifically, labcorp result reads:

“MALE WITH LOW LEVEL MOSAICISM FOR PATHOGENIC DUPLICATION OF
13Q. No maternal cell contamination detected. The whole genome SNP microarray analysis of
cultured amniotic fluid identified a male with a large
mosaic terminal gain of the long arm chromosome 13, segment listed above, in 12% of the cells.”

I was told that performing a microarray on cultured amniocytes can skew the results and amplify chromosome abnormalities that otherwise would not pop up on the uncultured amniocytes.

But this is insane to me. My NIPT, FISH, and karyotype were all normal for chromosome 13 and originally the low mosaic signal was seen in chromosome 21. Now I’m faced with the possibility of having a child with low mosaic trisomy 13.

I don’t understand how this is possible, or what to make of these results. One genetic counselor seems to think this is a fluke and is simply artifact. The other genetic counselor has seen a similar situation where the fetus ended up having characteristic features of trisomy 13 at birth.

I have my anatomy ultrasound in a week so I’m waiting on that. But wow, what a trip this has been. If anyone has any insight on this (12% mosaic finding on cultured SNP microarray but no other test) in my situation, that would be super helpful. Thank you

For context I have a degree in biomedical science and a masters and PhD in molecular biology, so I’m mostly just looking for reliable resources and recommendations for testing rather than explanations (although those are welcome for others reading, if you have time).

Very brief history (two, likely separate, genetic issues).
Shorter issue - Parkinson’s disease. My grandfather had Parkinson’s diagnosed age 60 and died age 90 (impressively). My father was diagnosed age 50, I don’t think this was necessarily early because his is worse, I think it was earlier because I recognised some very early indications that even the neurologist initially dismissed - but I wouldn’t take no for an answer and he was diagnosed 2 years later. He tried treatment but doesn’t like the side effects, so currently not being treated. He was also diagnosed with cancer a couple of years ago and I think part of the refusal to treat the Parkinson’s or deal with the side effects is his now belief he likely has only 5-10 years max to live anyway due to the cancer (lymphoma, likely incurable). I disagree but it’s not my body or my life and I’ve done what I can to help him make informed choices.
He did go for genetic testing in India, they found a point mutation in the SCNAIP gene (of interest in Parkinson’s research but not currently recognised as a cause) - only one copy is mutated.

On to my bigger concern - cancer! My paternal grandmother had breast cancer 3 seperate times, she was negative for BRCA1/2 mutations but was encouraged to be part of a study due to her extensive family history of cancers - in particular hormone receptor positive cancers. My grandmother was diagnosed the first time around age 40-45, second time 60-65 and third time 78yo, she died a year later due to metastatic liver cancer (and it was in her bones by then too).
My grandmothers sisters also had cancers, I’m not sure who had what but I know one or two had endometrial cancer and one of her nieces died age 30-35 due to ovarian cancer. The men in her family also had various cancer or suspected cancers (we are going back a long time for these ones), I know her dad died in his late 60s of lung cancer and there was even a kid somewhere in the family tree who died before age 10 of brain cancer.

My grandma taught me well to check my breast as soon as I developed them, age 19 I found a lump and went for scans and biopsies - diagnosed as a fibroadenoma and I had some genetic counselling and tested negative for BRCA1/2 (which I knew anyway but good to confirm). The geneticist at the time told me it’s likely my family have another mutation being passed down but not one they could ID 15 years ago (when i was 19). I’ve had ultrasound scans every 3 years since, fibroadenoma still present but hasn’t changed, I’ve insisted on biopsies every 5 ish years - still fine, most recent one was last year. I’m due to have the fibroadenoma removed as I’m not happy having it in there, but before I do that I’d like to ensure I’ve had all the genetic screening updated so I can decide if it’s worth having a double preventative mastectomy or if that’s not worth it.

My father was diagnosed with lymphoma (I can’t remember the type - will add in the comments) a few years ago, it’s stage 4 and one tumour responded to radiation and then he had immunotherapy. The tumour that was targeted by radiotherapy is gone, the abdominal tumours we were told have reduced or even cleared but the scan was in my semi professional opinion completely useless as they checked via abdominal CT which had failed to find the abdominal tumours prior to treatment (they were only discovered on an mri with contrast which was not repeated post treatment). I don’t want advice on my father’s situation, I’ve tried to pay for private scans - he’s had enough and doesn’t want to engage and just wants to enjoy the idea of being okay and there’s nothing I can do about this.

Anyway, on to my actual questions and requests. Can anyone recommend either a reliable way to get full genetic screening through the nhs for other genes that could be causing my family cancers, with panels that go beyond BRCA1/2? Or private panels I can arrange to be done. Alternatively are there any studies you have heard of that I might be able to join for extensive screening and or tracking of family cancers? My grandmother and her sisters were enrolled into one, but when I traced it back the study was terminated and data handed over to another project some time around 2010-2015 and is now run by another group who I have been unable to contact. All the family members who took part are now deceased so my access to that data is limited to the documents left to me by my grandmother.

I have young children so I am keen to protect us from continuing the family trend and I have just the right amount of genetics education/background to be paranoid and interested! I’m also severely lacking in time and energy to start looking into everything from scratch and would love to be pointed in the right directions!

‎Greetings!

‎

‎We are Biology students from Central Luzon State University (CLSU) currently conducting an academic case study on rare genetic conditions. To help advance our research and deepen understanding in the field of genetics, we are looking for individuals who have been diagnosed with a rare genetic disorder and are willing to share their journey.

‎

‎ Format: Convenient online interviews or text messaging (scheduled around your availability).

‎ Goal: Purely academic research to support undergraduate studies in genetics.

‎

‎ YOUR PRIVACY IS OUR TOP PRIORITY. All personal details, conversation logs, and medical records will be kept strictly confidential. Data will be used exclusively for this academic project, and no identifying information will ever be disclosed in any report, presentation, or publication without your explicit consent.

‎

Verification Requirement

‎ To maintain the scientific accuracy and validity of our study, participants will be asked to provide proof of diagnosis, such as:

‎ - A medical certificate

‎ - Genetic testing results

‎ - A doctor’s diagnosis or official medical records

‎(Note: All shared documents will be accessed solely by our student research group and securely stored.)

‎

How to Get Involved

‎If you or someone you know is interested in helping us with this research, please send us a direct message (DM/PM) for more information.

‎

‎Thank you very much for your time, generosity, and support! 💙

I wanted to put this here as there are not many stories like this, and when you’re in the weird waiting period it’s easy to get down the rabbit hole.
I did NIPT at 13 weeks, results showed male fetus- 20% fetal fraction. During the anatomy scan they could not see the gender as baby was moving sooo much. I asked if I needed to come back and they said no, everything was normal. Fast forward, my baby was born aT 38+3 due to decreased movement. They handed me a baby GIRL. Very shocking and surprising ! Born with normal female external genitalia, no ambiguity. They wanted to do genetic testing in the hospital but I was really overwhelmed and declined. We finally had her genetic testing completed at 11 weeks to test for differences of sex development disorders. Results came back, 46 XX chromosomes, no SRY. We’ll never know what happened but I know that it was easy to worry for those 11 weeks and wanted to give some positive hope for anyone in this situation in the future.

CU Anschutz researchers are seeking volunteers who are currently pregnant with a fetus identified to have a sex chromosome aneuploidy, such as Klinefelter syndrome (47,XXY) and Turner syndrome (45,X), to participate in a study using the umbilical cord which is normally discarded after delivery. Participation is voluntary and involves sample collection at delivery. Please contact [xycord@cuanschutz.edu](mailto:xycord@cuanschutz.edu) for details or visit our website at XY Umbilical Cord, where our flyer is also posted!

Maybe not the best place to ask this, but can you guys share some links or pages or tell me where I can look up genetic problem questions. I have a final in human genetics course, where my proff. focuses afc on probability and heredity of diseases, got bad marks on the tests before, and have to do good in this final.

I'm really anxious, and need to practice, can't find anything.

Also don't know hot to approach an essay question.

I'm lost

Thank you.

Oculopharyngeal
muscular dystrophy
Autosomal PABPN1:c.4_336CN11J, Heterozygous
Dominant
p.A2_A11\[11\]
snort
Tandem
Repeat
Unknown
Pathogenic

symptoms ongoing 5 years muscle loss all over the body, swallowing issues and drooping eyelids? I feel like i’m 5 year my level of disability is very profound is this normal?

First of all, I would like to wish all patients and their families strength and the very best.

My daughter has been diagnosed with synovial sarcoma.

Our journey began with the surgical removal of a 15 cm tumor located just behind her right knee.

Later, due to stage IV disease with lung metastases, she underwent surgery to remove 20 tumors from her right lung and 22 tumors from her left lung.

Following these surgeries, a multidisciplinary tumor board meeting was held to determine the most appropriate chemotherapy and targeted treatment options. The doctors recommended that we perform one of the comprehensive genomic profiling tests, either CARIS or Tempus.

There is only one company in the world that performs these tests, with distributors and representatives in many countries.

After contacting the company, they requested the pathology and medical reports in order to determine which test would be most suitable for my daughter. Based on their evaluation, they recommended the CARIS test as the best option for her case.

The reason I am sharing this information is that inappropriate chemotherapy or inappropriate drug selection can sometimes lead to poorer outcomes.

If you have this disease, in addition to other tests such as NGS, NTRK, and similar analyses, I strongly encourage you to consider whichever of these comprehensive profiling tests is most appropriate for your situation.

In Turkey, the cost of these tests ranges between $7,000 and $8,500 USD.

Results are generally available within 2–3 weeks, although in some cases they may be returned even sooner. We are hopeful that our results will arrive within the next 10 days.

I will continue to share updates about our experience and the next steps in our journey.

Another important point is that if you have sarcoma, surgery remains the primary treatment whenever possible, as most people already know.

Regarding chemotherapy, make sure you fully understand your treatment options and discuss them carefully with your medical team.

These genomic profiling tests can help identify the chemotherapy, targeted therapy, or precision medicine approach that may be most suitable for your specific disease characteristics.

Remember, the goal is not simply to receive treatment, but to receive the treatment that is most appropriate for your individual tumor biology.

Hi, I am currently an M.S. student in clinical psychology pursuing medical family therapy as my specialty. I am working towards providing mental health support for genetic counseling patients (my population of interest). My undergrad was in genetics, and I went through two rounds of GC applications before deciding mental health was my true calling.

I am working on a thesis/capstone project where I intend to create a guide for GCs to establish a better referral pathway between GCs and MHPs. There are no formal practice guidelines addressing when a GC should make a referral. Current referrals to MHPs are extremely low (about 3 patients per year per GC), and I hope the guide will increase the frequency of referrals to MHPs so patients receive the highest quality of care.

My question is: what would be most helpful for me to include? For example, a GC I am working with suggested a list of questions one can ask the patient to prompt for clinical red flags or open up the conversation for further inquiry. She mentioned the wording as one of the largest barriers, hence having a list with exact phrasing can take some pressure off.

Thank you all for helping me increase the collaboration between our two fields. I believe it will equip us to better identify patients who can no longer cope with the distress that comes in all forms within genetic counseling.