Is it possible not to do Down syndrome screening?

Is it necessary to do Down syndrome screening? Pregnant women should keep abreast of the growth and development of the fetus during pregnancy. Prenatal check-ups are necessary. Down syndrome screening is to extract blood cells from pregnant women and test the concentrations of several substances in the blood cells to determine whether the fetus is healthy. Therefore, it is recommended to do it.

What is Down syndrome screening?

Down screening refers to a special testing method that is aimed at special groups that do not have any corresponding disease signs (such as all pregnant women). Through testing, key subjects who are most likely to suffer from a certain disease are selected for subsequent diagnosis-related examinations.

One thing that needs to be established is that the purpose of screening is not to diagnose a certain disease, but to select people who are very likely to have a certain disease.

The current screening and diagnosis of Down syndrome, trisomy 18 and congenital neural tube defects is a systematic approach. First, for all pregnant women, the pregnant women with a higher risk of having their fetuses suffer from congenital idiocy, tongue-throwing dementia and other three diseases are screened out through the screening method, and the next step of diagnosis-related examinations is carried out. If the fetus is finally diagnosed with these congenital diseases, the pregnant woman can make her own decision whether to get pregnant again.

The above-mentioned diseases usually use the same screening method, that is, based on your age, weight, AFP and β-HCG levels in your venous blood, combined with some other conditions (such as whether you smoke or drink alcohol, etc.), the risk of your fetus suffering from the above three congenital diseases is calculated. Depending on the risk score you will get a positive (high risk) or negative (low risk) result.

The actual method is to draw chorionic blood or amniotic fluid of the pregnant woman for cell culture, and then do chromosome karyotype analysis. If the 21-trisomy syndrome map is found, the fetus can be diagnosed with Down syndrome. 2. The Chinese name of AFP is alpha-fetoprotein. If the AFP levels in the mother's blood and the amniotic fluid of the fetus are elevated, it is confirmed that the fetus has a neural tube defect, namely spina bifida, meningocele, anencephaly, microcephaly, and hydrocephalus.