All the Italian Centres in charge of screening, diagnosis, and follow-up of infants with congenital hypothyroidism participate in the Italian National Registry of affected infants, which performs the nationwide surveillance of the disease. It was established in 1987 as a program of the Health Ministry and is coordinated by the Istituto Superiore di Sanità. The early diagnosis performed by the n...

OBJECTIVE To estimate potential costs and benefits of routinely using tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) to screen newborns for inborn errors of metabolism. METHOD Analysis of costs and benefits resulting from use of MS/MS in screening of 32 000 newborn infants using data from the Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program of Northern California plus other published data. SETTING A large health m...

Early diagnosis of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is widely advocated to initiate proactive interventions and genetic counselling. Genetic testing now allows the diagnosis of DMD even prior to the onset of symptoms. However, little is known about care practices and their impact on young DMD boys and families after receiving an early diagnosis. We analysed 64 young boys (Japan, 19; the United...

Well-organized conversation can improve people's ability to comprehend and retain information. As part of a long-term effort to adapt Quality Improvement techniques for communication, we developed an explicit-criteria method to assess usage of three organizing behaviors (OBs): 'opening behaviors' to establish goals; 'structuring behaviors' to guide patients through conversation; and 'emphasizin...

OBJECTIVE To determine coverage of the newborn screening program (NSP) for metabolic disease in Alberta, Canada, and to determine reasons for not being screened. STUDY DESIGN Coverage was estimated by deterministic matching of live birth registration data with newborn screening data for the year 1992. Demographic characteristics of not-matched infants were compared with good-match infants usi...

BACKGROUND The goal of newborn screening is early identification of babies with a high risk for disorders that may not be clinically evident at birth, but have severe consequences if untreated. New insight into inherited diseases and the ability to test for numerous diseases using new technique such as tandem mass spectrometry have made it practical to greatly expand the number of conditions te...

Newborn screening is the largest genetic testing effort in the United States and is considered one of the ten great public health achievements during the first 10 years of the 21st century. For over 35 years, the Newborn Screening Quality Assurance Program (NSQAP) at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has helped NBS laboratories ensure that their testing does not delay diagnosis,...

Newborn screening (NBS) exists in every state for the purpose of testing newborns for genetic medical conditions that can be severe, may be treatable, and are often not clinically evident at birth. While almost all of the diseases screened for in newborns have underlying genetic causes, NBS in its current form is performed not by testing for genetic mutations, but by testing for biochemical mar...

A short report is provided of an interview survey of 69 parents of boys suffering from Duchenne muscular dystrophy to determine their views of neonatal screening and their experiences at the time of diagnosis. Most of the parents favored screening in the neonatal period or in early infancy, and most of them expressed dissatisfaction with present delays, methods of disclosure, and subsequent su...