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First private medical genetics center is launched in Bucharest
The first private Medical Genetics Center in Romania, an investment worth more than two million euros, was launched in Bucharest on Tuesday during the conference entitled Personalized Medicine - New Prospects for the Romanian Patient.
The Center is part of the World Map of Next Generation Sequencers, a world network including the centers that use high-capacity genomic sequencer platforms, it has four floors totalling 650 square meters and offers integrated services of examination and genetic testing.
'The Microarray NimbleGen platform equipping the Personal Genetics medical genetics center is yet another unique initiative in the Romanian private medical sector, with major use in the prenatal and postnatal diagnosis', said Dr Bogdanka Militescu, the Genetics Center managing director.
The Center is structured by two departments, molecular biology and cyto-genetics respectively and it also offers genetic and psychological counseling.
The expertise of the molecular biology department is divided into three categories of tests: diagnosis tests, genetic predisposition tests and pharma-genetic tests.
The cyto-genetics department provides complex cyto-genetic diagnosis both for the prenatal diagnosis based on tests taken from chorionic villus, amniotic liquid, fetal blood, conceptive product as well as for the postnatal diagnosis from peripheral blood tests for the newborn babies, children or adults and from the hematogenous bone marrow in order to identify various types of leukemia.
Also conducted at the Center are tests for identifying lung cancer, colon cancer, the hereditary breast- and ovary cancer risk, among others.
Studies show that if the women having a breast cancer diagnosis made a genetic test before beginning treatment, there would be 34 percent less chemotherapy. Moreover, some 17,000 strokes could be prevented every year if a genetic test were made to assess the patient's response to anti-coagulant therapy.