Tests

The book the I read was Still Alice by Lisa Genova.  It encompassed a wonans travels through the world of losing her ability to remember things and losing her short term memory due to alzheimer’s disease.  One of the most interesting aspects of the book to me was when Alices family decided to get genetically tested for the disease.  This sparked a question in me as to how accurate gentic testing for alzheimer’s could be.  My hypothesis is that it is not ver acurate.  I did more research to find out.

“The utility of testing varies widely, however, depending on the magnitude of risk, the accuracy of risk prediction, options available to reduce risk, an individual’s previous experience, and the needs and experience of family members” (Evans).  This means that depending on the indivuals personal lifestyle choices and their parents personal lifestyle choices thier geAlzheimer’s disease (AD) accounts for approximately two-thirds of late-life dementias, afflicting an estimated 8% of people age 65 years and olderntetic testing scores could lean either way.  Such as there have been studies done that state, “Studies have reported increased amounts of aluminum in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease victims”(Perl).  If this relationship is true and a subjects of the genetic testing were exposed to a lot of aluminum as a child then they may have a higher risk that would not show up in genetic testing. 

“Alzheimer’s disease (AD) accounts for approximately two-thirds of late-life dementias, afflicting an estimated 8% of people age 65 years and older”(Small).   This shows that the genetic testing done has a minimal range of outcomes based on the amount of people that that have the disease.  This finalizes my point and the point that even when Alices family got tested their results may not have been accurate.  The book it self made me even want to get tested because of things that Alice experienced like wanting to remember Anna’s baby and wanting Lydia to act in something famous and wanting to remember tom falling in love.  These are all things that I eventually want in my life and forgetting them would be tradgic.  If Genetic testing was more accurate I would consider it.

Notes

Evan, James. “The complexities of predictive genetic testing .” British medical journal (2001): n. pag. Web. 24 Feb 2010. http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/322/7293/1052.

Perl, Daniel. “Relationship of Aluminum to Alzheimer’s.” Enviornmental Health Perspectives 63. (1985): 149-153. Web. 24 Feb 2010. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1568482/pdf/envhper00446-0148.pdf.

Genova, Lisa. Still Alice. Chicago: Pocket Books, 2009. Print.

Small, Gary. “Cerebral metabolic and cognitive decline in persons at genetic risk for Alzheimer’s disease.” Procedings of the National Academy of Sciencesof The Uninted States of America (2000): 6037–6042. Web. 24 Feb 2010. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC18554/>.