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	<title>Health &#38; FamilyCategory: Kids and DNA &#124; Health &#38; Family &#124; TIME.com</title>
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		<title>Health &#38; FamilyCategory: Kids and DNA &#124; Health &#38; Family &#124; TIME.com</title>
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		<title>Why Cheaper Genetic Testing Could Cost Us a Fortune</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/26/why-cheaper-genetic-testing-could-cost-us-a-fortune/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/26/why-cheaper-genetic-testing-could-cost-us-a-fortune/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 26 Oct 2012 09:40:04 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bonnie Rochman</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Alzheimer's Disease]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Arthritis]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Autism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Breast Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family & Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Insurance]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kids and DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pediatric Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DNA testing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dna tests]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetic discrimination]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetic testing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome sequencing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genomics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health insurance]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=72569</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Dana Nieder was at a loss. Doctors had been trying to figure out what was wrong with her daughter Maya since she was 7 months old. Now 4 1/2, Maya didn’t learn to walk until long after her second birthday and still can say only a few words. After exhausting other possibilities, Nieder decided to have part of Maya’s genome sequenced in a test so new that health insurers have balked at paying for it. &#8220;It seemed to be our only chance to find a genetic answer,&#8221; says Nieder, a former middle school science teacher from New York City. Unlocking the secrets of human DNA is one of the most promising avenues of medical research. (Read TIME&#8217;s complete series on genetic testing and families.) But along with a host of scientific and ethical issues, genome sequencing raises some tough economic questions at a time when U.S. health care costs are already spiraling. How much is this going to cost, and who’s going to pay? Whole-genome sequencing (WGS) is already relatively inexpensive — labs can analyze a person’s entire genetic code for under $10,000 — and the cost is dropping fast. But for some patients, this initial DNA report is the beginning, not the end, of their medical odyssey. And whether those journeys will increase the nation’s health costs isn’t clear. In an ideal scenario, genetic analysis could save money by catching diseases early, offering targeted treatments and underscoring the most effective preventive measures. In the worst case, it could deluge an already swamped health care system, as patients with ambiguous results begin to seek frequent screenings — and potentially unnecessary procedures — for diseases they might never develop. Princeton health care economist Uwe Reinhardt sees a future that skews toward the latter: “If someone held a gun to my head, I would have to say it will cost a lot more and it will create an enormous amount of anxiety. A certain amount of ignorance is really bliss.” More than half of the 1,254 doctors surveyed this year by UnitedHealthcare<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=72569&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Kids and DNA</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/kids-and-dna/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/20121020_dananieder_0138-edit.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">image: Dana Nieder turned to friends and strangers to help pay for her daughter Maya&#039;s exome sequencing</media:title>
		</media:content>

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		<title>What Your Doctor Isn&#8217;t Telling You About Your DNA</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/25/what-your-doctor-isnt-telling-you-about-your-dna/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/25/what-your-doctor-isnt-telling-you-about-your-dna/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 25 Oct 2012 09:40:09 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bonnie Rochman</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Disease]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family & Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kids and DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pediatric Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bioethics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[children's hospital of philadelphia]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ethics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetic testing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome sequencing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[incidental findings]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sequencing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=72475</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The test results were crystal clear, and still the doctors didn’t know what to do. A sick baby whose genome was analyzed at the Children&#8217;s Hospital of Philadelphia turned out to possess a genetic mutation that indicated dementia would likely take root around age 40. But that lab result was completely unrelated to the reason the baby&#8217;s DNA was being tested, leaving the doctors to debate: Should they share the bad news? When it comes to scanning DNA or sequencing the genome — reading the entire genetic code — what to do with unanticipated results is one of the thorniest issues confronting the medical community. Many conflicted discussions followed the dementia discovery at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) before a decision was reached: the parents would not be told that this fatal memory-sapping disease likely lurks in their child’s future. Given the hopelessness of the situation, with no treatment and no cure, the doctors said forwarding such information along felt pointless. “We came around to the realization that we could not divulge that information,” says Nancy Spinner, who directs the hospital laboratory that tested the infant. “One of the basic principles of medicine is to do no harm.&#8221; Around the same time, Spinner’s lab also tested another child — an unusually short 2-year-old referred for kidney disease — and discovered the toddler had a gene linked to a rare form of colon cancer. In some cases, polyps arising from this kind of cancer have been known to develop as early as age 7. This time, the decision to inform the parents was easier: “We feel good about that one,” says Spinner. “Proper screening can make a huge difference.” Across the country, a small but growing number of doctors are turning to increasingly sensitive genomic tests to pinpoint the root causes of young patients’ mystifying symptoms. But many still don’t know how to handle results unrelated to the ailments that prompted such sequencing. “If you’re looking in the area of chromosome 17 and BRCA1  [a breast-cancer gene] is nearby, you<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=72475&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Kids and DNA</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/kids-and-dna/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/1259_20121019_phillydr_0150-edit-edit.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">image: Nancy Spinner and her husband, Dr. Ian Krantz at the Children&#039;s Hospital of Philadelphia</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/ccc18529897902c0767bf2d7d088828e?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
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			<media:title type="html">kidsanddna</media:title>
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		<item>
		<title>The Trouble with My Daughter&#8217;s DNA</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/24/the-trouble-with-my-daughters-dna/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/24/the-trouble-with-my-daughters-dna/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 24 Oct 2012 09:40:12 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Laurie Hunter</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kids and DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pediatric Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetic testing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genomics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sequencing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Wolf-Hirschhorn]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=72382</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[By the time my first child was two months old, I knew something was wrong. Amanda, who is 14 now, has low muscle tone and didn’t walk until she was almost 2 years old. Her arms have limited ability, and she has inflammatory bowel disease. She’s been in speech and occupational therapy her whole life. As a mother, you know that everything that happens to your child is not your fault, yet you still feel responsible. We turned to genetic testing because I wanted answers. (Read TIME&#8217;s complete series on genetic testing for children) But I didn&#8217;t end up with any answers as to why she has these multiple disabilities. Instead it just raised more questions and added new challenges on top of the ones I&#8217;m already tackling. It went beyond Amanda. It ended up involving me and my son and my husband. And I wasn’t prepared for it. We did the first round of genetic testing when Amanda was 4 years old. Everything came back normal. We figured she’d just be delayed. Then we started realizing there was a cognitive element, that Amanda is mildly retarded. At the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), they told us that genetic testing gets better every year. So when she was 9, we did a second round of testing, and it came back normal too. My ex-husband kept saying I was looking for problems that don’t exist. More recently, Amanda seemed to be regressing. She can’t blow her nose anymore or wipe herself effectively. It’s like her muscles are getting tighter and not moving in the way they should. In March, we did a third round of testing — this time we did a more advanced test that reads deeper into her genome. The test captures deletions and microdeletions that the previous tests might have overlooked. (MORE: A Photo Tour of a Genetic Testing Lab) When the results came in in late July, a genetics counselor called me to say there were deletions on Amanda’s first chromosome. I was excited at first,  sort of happy and<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=72382&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Kids and DNA</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/kids-and-dna/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/20121021_lauriehunter_0280-edit1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
		<media:thumbnail url="http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/20121021_lauriehunter_0280-edit1.jpg?w=240" />
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			<media:title type="html">image: Both of Laurie Hunter&#039;s daughters, Amanda and Kailyn, have genetic diseases. Her 4-year-old son, Ryan, is developing normally.</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/3cb61b88047e46fa55ea7dd6bf87ec1c?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
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			<media:title type="html">kidsanddna</media:title>
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		<media:content url="http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/20121021_lauriehunter_0166-edit1.jpg?w=360" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">image: Laurie Hunter, a high school English teacher in N.J., learned that she had passed on a genetic mutation that heightens the risk of cancer to her daughter, Amanda.</media:title>
		</media:content>
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		<item>
		<title>Test Your DNA for Diseases — No Doctor Required</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/23/drugstore-genomes-whos-pushing-the-sequencing-industry/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/23/drugstore-genomes-whos-pushing-the-sequencing-industry/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 23 Oct 2012 10:50:45 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bonnie Rochman</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Alzheimer's Disease]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Breast Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Disease]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family & Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kids and DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pediatric Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Research]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[23andMe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Amar Kamath]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Anne Wojcicki]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[APOE-4]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[GeneDx]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome sequencing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Illumina]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Knome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Martin Tolar]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sequencing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sergey Brin]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=72171</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When Anne Wojcicki’s son was a baby, she ran a swab across the inside of his cheek, collecting DNA to send to a lab. Last year, when she was pregnant with her daughter, she tested her amniotic cells. The goal in each case: to get a glimpse of her children’s genes and determine whether they contain certain kinks that increase the risk of developing anything from gallstones to multiple sclerosis. “As a parent,” says Wojcicki, “the most responsible thing I can do is get as much information about my children as possible so I can then think through how I can make them as healthy as possible.” Wojcicki isn’t just any random parent, though. She’s a Yale-educated biologist and the co-founder and CEO of 23andMe, a company in Mountain View, Calif., that sells DNA analysis directly to consumers — no doctor required (See TIME&#8217;s inside look into 23andMe&#8217;s genetic testing lab here). “Your information is your information,” says Wojcicki, who is married to Google co-founder Sergey Brin. “If you want it, you should be able to have it.” Genetic tests have been around for years, but in 2003 scientists took the field a step further, announcing the first complete mapping of a human genome — an entire genetic code. Sequencing, or &#8220;reading,&#8221; a person’s genome is one of the newest, most controversial tools in the medical arsenal because of the mother lode of information it contains about future disease risk. Genetic markers for heart disease or cancer may spur consumers toward healthier behavior. But when it comes to conditions such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson&#8217;s that can&#8217;t be prevented, many experts are divided on whether knowing is helpful or harmful. Yet even as physicians and bioethicists wrestle with the implications of revealing dark DNA secrets, entrepreneurs like Wojcicki are planning to make whole-genome sequencing (WGS) available directly to the public. Other companies, like San Diego–based Illumina, are already offering the test to what its CEO, Jay Flatley, calls a “healthy and proactive” demographic. So far, these tests have been aimed mainly at early<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=72171&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Kids and DNA</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/kids-and-dna/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/time_anne_wojcicki_035.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">kidsanddna</media:title>
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		<title>Will My Son Develop Cancer? The Promise (and Pitfalls) of Sequencing Children&#8217;s Genomes</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/22/will-my-son-develop-cancer-the-promise-and-pitfalls-of-sequencing-childrens-genomes/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/10/22/will-my-son-develop-cancer-the-promise-and-pitfalls-of-sequencing-childrens-genomes/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 22 Oct 2012 09:00:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Bonnie Rochman</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Alzheimer's Disease]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Disease]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family & Parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Kids and DNA]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pediatric Genetics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[CHOP]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Colleen McBride]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Emma Warin]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genome sequencing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[genomics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Ian Krantz]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[incidental findings]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Inova]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[John Niederhuber]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Juliet Belcher]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nancy Spinner]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[National Human Genome Research Institute]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[NHGRI]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[sequencing]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Can you imagine wanting to know whether your newborn baby will fall victim to Alzheimer’s disease decades down the road? What about cancer or diabetes? Emma Warin can. In August she gave birth to a healthy 8-lb., 3-oz. boy. She agreed to participate in an unprecedented study in which researchers will map out every speck of DNA in her son’s genome, potentially revealing mutations that could cause health problems now and far into the future. Warin, a medical-device sales representative in Falls Church, Va., says the information will help her plan ahead for any issues. Still, she adds, “It’s a little scary.” (TIME Explains: The Science of Genome Sequencing) When it comes to your health, the debate about how much information is too much is about to get a lot more complicated. Whole-genome sequencing (WGS), a scientific breakthrough less than 10 years old, is on its way to becoming a mainstream medical test. When researchers first mapped a human genome in 2003, the effort cost $2.7 billion. Now the price for analyzing a person&#8217;s genetic code is down to $7,500 and falling. As the test gets cheaper, it’s expanding beyond cancer patients seeking tailored therapies and people suffering from mystery illnesses; the government is already starting to consider the possibility of scanning the genome of every newborn baby. Eventually the test could even become available through drugstores, for anyone with curiosity and a credit card. Experts say this will open an uncharted — and possibly chilling — frontier in medicine. WGS can provide early warnings about some of the deadliest and most debilitating diseases. Those warnings, in turn, can enable timely treatment or at least allow people to make plans about long-term care. But the drawbacks can be significant. Murky findings, for instance, can send patients on odysseys of costly, risky and potentially unnecessary additional tests. WGS raises tough questions for all patients, but it’s quickly becoming clear that some of the most complicated issues center on one group: kids. After all, the youngest patients have the most to gain<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=71991&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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	<primary_category>Kids and DNA</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/kids-and-dna/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/emma-warin-genome-sequencing1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Image: Emma Warin and her baby are healthy, but they are participating in a study in northern Virginia that is analyzing her entire genetic code and that of her husband and 2-month-old son.</media:title>
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