All genetic tests are equally reliable and precise

Even though there are a lot of genetic tests on the market right now, not all of them are equally accurate and dependable. Genetic testing is now widely used and easily accessible, sometimes even without a doctor's involvement, thanks to advancements in sequencing technology. When considering genetic testing, it's critical to do your homework to determine exactly what you want to learn and which test would produce the most reliable findings. For instance, some tests, such presymptomatic testing for Huntington's disease, produce results with almost 100% accuracy. When indicating your propensity for a certain disease, other tests could assign you a % risk.

It is crucial to appropriately understand the results of genetic tests. You can learn via a genetic test that you have a 15% probability of contracting a particular disease. At first, this statistic seems scary, but following additional research, you learn that the general population has a 13% risk of contracting the same condition.

This means that even if your risk is higher than the norm, it is not big enough to warrant making significant adjustments to your lifestyle in order to prevent contracting the illness. For instance, the prevalence of Alzheimer's disease is about 7% in the general population. The chance of developing Alzheimer's disease can be increased by twofold by some APOE gene variants. A twofold risk is still just about 14 percent, though.

Genetic tests that identify illness predispositions do not guarantee that you will eventually get a disease; rather, they demonstrate that you are more likely than the average person to get the condition. If you want to have genetic testing, it is crucial to discuss the results with a physician, genetic counselor, or other healthcare provider who has received training in analyzing genetic test results. (2011) (Donnelly).