Doctors Should Test for Down Syndrome

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"The important take-home message is this: Better testing is available with higher detection rates and lower false-positive rates," said Dr. James D. Goldberg, medical director at San Francisco Perinatal Associates and immediate past chairman of the association's Committee on Genetics.

The ultimate decision about screening, though, should remain with the mother, the doctors said. After all, she must decide whether to continue with a pregnancy if there are indications the child will have a birth defect.

"It's clear that people make a decision on whether to have basic testing based on a number of factors -- age, risk, feelings about having a child with a chromosomal abnormality," Goldberg said. "A lot of things go into individual risk decision-making."

Also at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists meeting on Monday, doctors urged their colleagues to pay more attention to the problem of depression during and after pregnancy.

"It is very common, yet it's something we don't screen for," said Dr. Paul A. Gluck, an associate clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine in Florida. By contrast, he said, doctors routinely screen pregnant women for birth defects that are very rare.

Even if doctors do think about screening for depression, some are "afraid about opening a Pandora's box" by discovering that a woman is depressed and not knowing what to do about it, Gluck said.

He said the solution is a system that allows for referrals that bring women the help they need.

More information

Learn more about the new recommendations from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.