By now everyone is familiar with the recent accomplishments of the Human Genome Project. Accomplished in ten, rather than the initially expected fifteen, years, the human genome has been fully sequenced. Genetics is in its golden age. A product of the technology era, genetics has, in a short time, offered vast amounts of information. This increased knowledge promises potential benefits for our understanding of the disease process and, ultimately, treatment and prevention. The rapid flow of information, however, presents complications and challenges. It can complicate the decision making process for those involved in genetic testing, not only because our knowledge of genetics is more complex, but because there is so much more potential information to obtain. The sheer quantity of information for both researcher, clinician and especially patient, can be overwhelming. In addition, our ability to glean predictive or susceptibility information has vastly exceeded our ability to develop cures for diseases; patients can increasingly identify risks for conditions that they can do little to avoid.

中文翻译：

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产前检查的常规化

至此，人类基因组计划最近取得的成就，大家都已经耳熟能详了。在 10 年内完成，而不是最初预期的 15 年，人类基因组已被完全测序。遗传学正处于黄金时代。作为技术时代的产物，遗传学在短时间内提供了大量信息。这种增加的知识有望为我们了解疾病过程以及最终的治疗和预防带来潜在的好处。然而，信息的快速流动带来了复杂性和挑战。它会使参与基因检测的人的决策过程复杂化，不仅因为我们对遗传学的了解更复杂，而且因为有更多的潜在信息需要获取。研究人员、临床医生，尤其是患者的海量信息，可能是压倒性的。此外，我们收集预测性或易感性信息的能力大大超过了我们开发疾病治疗方法的能力；患者可以越来越多地识别他们无法避免的疾病的风险。