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Psychological impact of genetic testing for adult‐onset disorders
Author(s) -
Meiser Bettina,
Glseson Margaret A,
Tucker Katherine M
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
medical journal of australia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.904
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1326-5377
pISSN - 0025-729X
DOI - 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2000.tb127938.x
Subject(s) - genetic testing , psychological testing , psychological distress , disease , clinical psychology , psychology , medicine , test (biology) , genetic counseling , psychiatry , anxiety , genetics , biology , paleontology
Testing for gene mutations that confer susceptibility to adult‐onset disorders has potential benefits, but these must be balanced against the psychological harms, if any. We review published findings on the psychological effects of such testing, focusing on Huntington's disease, which has the most available data, and the hereditary cancer syndromes. Most of the evidence suggests that non‐carriers and carriers differ significantly in terms of short‐term, but not long‐term, psychological adjustment to test results. The psychological impact of genetic testing depends more on pretest psychological distress than the test result itself.