DNA and Genetics: DNA Consumer Testing

At home DNA tests : marketing scam or medical breakthrough : hearing before the Special Committee on Aging, United States Senate, One Hundred Ninth Congress, second session, Washington, DC, July 27, 2006

Artin, M. G., Stiles, D., Kiryluk, K., & Chung, W. K. (2019). Cases in Precision Medicine: When Patients Present With Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Test Results. Annals of Internal Medicine, 170(9), 643–650. https://doi.org/10.7326/M18-2356

Ram, N. (2019). Genetic Privacy After Carpenter. Virginia Law Review, 105(7), 1357–1425.

Whitley, K. V., Tueller, J. A., & Weber, K. S. (2020). Genomics Education in the Era of Personal Genomics: Academic, Professional, and Public Considerations. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 21(3), 768. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms21030768

Mail-in genetic tests offer a wealth of information about your ancestry and insight into medical risks — in exchange for a lot of data. Here’s where that data goes, and how to delete it.

Bland, J. S. (2019). In Defense of Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing. Integrative Medicine: A Clinician’s Journal, 18(4), 8–10.

Wade, C. H. (2019). What Is the Psychosocial Impact of Providing Genetic and Genomic Health Information to Individuals? An Overview of Systematic Reviews. Hastings Center Report, 49, S88–S96. https://doi.org/10.1002/hast.1021

Today’s DNA kits can reveal secrets that affect not just your own family but strangers as well. Should one person’s right to know take precedence over another’s life narrative?

In vitro diagnostics (IVDs) that are marketed directly to consumers without the involvement of a health care provider are called direct-to-consumer tests (also referred to as DTC). These tests generally request the consumer collect a specimen, such as saliva or urine, and send it to the company for testing and analysis.

Genetic screening companies offer direct to consumer (dtc) genetic tests that let you check your genetic predisposition for diseases without a doctor's order! Would you buy one?

How do we accomplish our mission? By educating others about the use of genetics in genealogy. This is done through workshops, our wiki, a speaker's bureau, our forums, and meetings. Although we do not have regular meetings, meetings are important as they allow for the dissemination of information and help maintain forward momentum. Even though ISOGG members are geographically spread out, we do what is possible to hold meetings at events and online.

As the field of genomics advances, genetic and genomic tests are becoming more common in, and out of, the clinic. Yet most genetic tests today are not regulated, meaning that they go to market without any independent analysis to verify the claims of the seller.

Direct-to-consumer genetic testing is ... marketed directly to customers via television, print advertisements, or the Internet, and the tests can be bought online or in stores. Customers send the company a DNA sample and receive their results directly from a secure website or in a written report. Direct-to-consumer genetic testing provides people access to their genetic information without necessarily involving a healthcare provider or health insurance company in the process.

Approximately 7 million ancestry tests have been ordered by curious consumers, most of those in the past few years. That’s a lot of DNA! Ethnic background is one type of result that can come from an online DNA test, along with others like physical traits, wellness factors, carrier status for recessive conditions, and estimates of genetic relatedness to others who have also tested.

This Progress Educational Trust/University of Liverpool event discusses the impact of genetic testing on donor conception and donor anonymity.

In the May issue of Clinical Chemistry, Linnea Baudhuin, Ph.D., of the Mayo Clinic, assessed 23andMe, one of the largest direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing facilities, and its Personal Genome Service (PGS) test.

BioethicsBytes. With the cost of DNA sequencing falling dramatically in the decade since the complete human genome was sequenced, a variety of companies are now offering mail order or "direct to consumer" genetic tests.

Timothy Caulfield, Research Director for Health Law and Science Policy at the University of Alberta, Canada, talks to Sandra Bendiscioli, EMBO Science Policy, about some of the limitations of personalized medicine, in particular in relation to the promises made by Direct-to-Consumers companies.

National Human Genome Research Institute
June 14, 2016 - Webinars for Health Insurers and Payers: Understanding Genetic Testing
More: https://www.genome.gov/27563343/