I hate when people think
Down's Syndrome is simply a matter of
having mental retardation.
Let's not forget that they are really
prone to heart disease and it is damned
near inevitable that by age 40, they will
develop Alzheimer's Disease. It isn't as
if we are depriving them of a life without
suffering to some
extent.
I had a niece with Down's who died a few
months ago. She was about 40. But up
until last year, she actually lived a
pretty good life. Except for her physical
limitations, her life was fairly normal.
Her mother took good care of her, and was
extremely protective of her. I think that
if anyone had suggested to her that her
daughter should've been aborted, they
would've had a fight on their hands just
trying to get away.
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Tylanas
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Posted: 02-28-08 00:04am
It's not that a fetus with downs "should"
be aborted, its that they COULD be
aborted. And it is up to the mother - and
in part the father since I assume we're
talking about planned pregnancies within
marriage/legal unions here.
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yodavater
Active User, Really EHEALTHy
Joined: 10 Dec 2007 Posts: 818
Posted: 02-29-08 16:48pm
Eiri
wrote:
It's not that a fetus with
downs "should" be aborted, its that they
COULD be aborted.
.
Well you could say that about all unborn
babies.
What I'm talking about is that just having
Down's Syndrome is not a death sentence,
and many such children lead meaningful
lives.
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Snug
Experienced User , Rather EHEALTHy
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Posted: 03-01-08 12:21pm
Moo
wrote:
meblonde01
wrote:
At what stage of the
pregnancy can they tell? Does anyone
know?
You can have a nuchal translucency test
(via ultrasound and bloodtests) from 11
weeks which will give an indication of the
risk and then further tests from that
point
Exactly. And amnio or CVS will miss about
1% of the Downs cases, but there are NO
"false positives." Only "false
negatives."
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Verizon-y
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Posted: 03-02-08 01:13am
How can amnio miss any cases?
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Snug
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Posted: 03-02-08 09:46am
futureshock
wrote:
How can amnio miss any
cases?
With mosaic trisomy 21, only some of the
fetal cells are affected. If the amnio
happens by sheer chance to contain only
normals cells, it will come back as
negative for Downs. That's a rare bit of
bad luck, but it has happened.
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Verizon-y
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Posted: 03-02-08 11:38am
That's awful. I had an amnio because I
wanted to know for sure. I'm glad I
didn't know there was a chance it could be
wrong.
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Tylanas
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Posted: 03-02-08 11:44am
Well it's only a 1% chance. Most birth
control is less effective than that lol.
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nightangel73
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Posted: 03-02-08 11:55am
futureshock
wrote:
That's awful. I had an
amnio because I wanted to know for sure.
I'm glad I didn't know there was a chance
it could be
wrong.
why did you had an amnio? Did blood test
said it could have Downs?
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Verizon-y
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Posted: 03-02-08 12:27pm
I was 33 when I conceived and 34 when I
delivered, so I was close enough to age 35
(which is when the tests were recommended
at that time) that I wanted to take the
test to be absolutely sure everything was
ok. We skipped all of the preliminary
tests because they still had a margin of
error, for ex. the blood test could come
back normal and the fetus could still have
Downs.
