Patient's question:
I have an itchy lower body, and my underwear is always yellow. What's going on? How can a blood test detect the risk of having a Down syndrome child?Doctor's answer:
Down syndrome screening is a method that involves drawing blood from a pregnant woman to detect the concentration of alpha-fetoprotein and human chorionic gonadotropin in maternal serum, and then calculating the risk coefficient of giving birth to a child with Down syndrome by combining the pregnant woman's estimated due date, age, weight, and gestational age at the time of blood collection. The optimal time for screening is between the 15th and 20th weeks of pregnancy. Generally, pregnant women can receive the screening results within one week after blood collection. If the result is high-risk, there is no need to panic, as further tests such as amniocentesis and fetal chromosome examination are required to confirm the diagnosis.