Place et role du conseil genetique

Genetic counseling is a medical act that consists of informing a patient of his/her risk of developing a genetic disorder, or of transmitting it to his/her offspring, and of informing about diagnostic and therapeutic options, allowing for informed choices. When about a risk to future offspring, genetic counseling is often linked to prenatal diagnosis with elective termination of affected pregnancies, or in selected cases, to pre-implatation sorting of embryos ("pre-implantation diagnosis"). In a growing number of indications regarding late-onst hereditary disorders, like Huntington's chorea or some hereditary cancers, genetic counseling aims at optimizing medical prevention, or at allowing patients to make life choices which they deem appropriate. The coming years will witness the blossoming of tests allowing for medical previsions based on the genome ("predictive medicine") in frequent, multigenic disorders, or allowing to target drug therapies to the biochemical individualities of patients (pharmacogenetics). The reliability of predictions will however be limited by the role of environment and stochastic factors involved in the development of virtually all genetic or biochemical traits.SCOPUS: ar.j