Doctors are pushing biracial Brooklyn women to undergo genetic counseling to learn if their racial mix makes them more prone to disease.
As interracial families have beome more common, Dr. Millicent Comrie, Chief of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Downstate Long Island College Hospital, has urged her staff of about 40 physicians to quiz patients about their ethnic backgrounds.
Those from multicultural backgrounds are are sent to talk with a DNA expert who maps out how their heritage could make them sick.
“Ethnicity plays a big part in your healthcare,” said Comrie naming a slew of hereditary diseases such as sickle cell anemia which plagues the black community and Tay-Sachs disease found in many Jewish families.
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“We can’t worry about sensitivity when it comes to race. What you see isn’t always what you get,” Comrie said. “If we don’t ask the right questions. We will come up short.”
View the full article here: Biracial women pushed to undergo genetic screening: Cobble Hill hospital focuses on mixed race
