Second trimester screening for Down's syndrome is widely practised throughout the world. We assessed the performance of antenatal serum screening for Down's syndrome with the quadruple test in 46193 pregnancies from 14 hospitals over 5 years. Women who screened positive (risk > or =1 in 300) were offered diagnostic amniocentesis or chorionic villus sampling. Of 88 observed Down's syndrome pregn...

OBJECTIVES To determine the second trimester Down's syndrome screening performance of maternal serum dimeric inhibin A, both alone and in combination with existing serum markers. SETTING A case-control set of serum samples from patients with Down's syndrome (52) and subjects with matched unaffected pregnancies obtained in a previous cohort study before second trimester amniocentesis and karyo...

Maternal serum screening has gained widespread acceptance as a major prenatal screening tool for chromosomal abnormalities in the US and Europe since Merkatz et al described an association between low maternal serum alpha fetoprotein (AFP) levels and increased risk for trisomy 21 in 1984. In 1988, Wald et al proposed a screening program based on maternal age in combination with three biochemica...

BACKGROUND To examine whether maternal serum levels of müllerian-inhibiting substance (MIS) differ in Down's syndrome and unaffected pregnancies. METHODS Case-control study was conducted using stored serum from an antenatal screening programme. Sera from 25 Down's syndrome pregnancies were retrieved from -20 degrees C storage together with 125 unaffected controls individually matched for mate...

OBJECTIVE To examine the distribution of maternal serum pregnancy-associated plasma protein-A (PAPP-A) and free β-human chorionic gonadotropin (β-hCG) at 12, 22 and 32 weeks' gestation in singleton pregnancies which develop pre-eclampsia (PE) and examine the performance of these biomarkers in screening for PE. METHODS Serum PAPP-A and free β-hCG were measured in 94 989 cases at 11-13 weeks, 7...

Maternal serum afetoprotein in multiples of the median FIG 4-Absolute probability of carrying babies with Down's syndrome at maternal serum ct fetoprotein concentrations according to maternal age at expected date of delivery. (*Probability calculated by two previous reports.4 5) With a screening programme to identify a group of mothers at increased risk of a pregnancy with Down's syndrome, it i...

UNLABELLED Congenital syphilis (CS) is an important health problem in Chile, with a rate of 0.25/1,000 live newborn (NB) during year 2004. In 2000, the Chilean Ministry of Public Health recommended to perform a screening in cord blood at the moment of delivery. Instead, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines recommend the screening in maternal serum since cord blood has up to...