Blood test can detect Down’s syndrome during pregnancy

Flemish company Multiplicom has brought the first commercial blood test for the detection of Down’s syndrome during pregnancy to the Belgian market. Multiplicom, a spin-off of Antwerp University, is based in Niel, Antwerp province, and has already launched the commercial BRCA test to track the breast cancer gene, used in more than half of European medical laboratories.

University hospitals have developed their own tests to detect Down’s syndrome, but until now other labs have depended on foreign kits that had to be sent to the US for analysis. In both cases, the results took about three weeks. With the new test, called Clarigo, researchers will have results in about three days, according to Dirk Pollet of Multiplicom.

Clarigo, which costs about €400, tracks the baby’s DNA in the mother’s blood, searching for deviations on specific chromosomes. During evaluations, the non-invasive test has not missed one case of Down’s syndrome.

The test replaces the classic screening of the skin fold measurement, which is much less accurate: about 25% of case are missed. There also is an invasive method, which requires an injection in the stomach. This test is accurate but causes miscarriage in about 1% of cases.