Can Our Genetic Blueprint Reveal Future Health Risks?
Can Our Genetic Blueprint Reveal Future Health Risks? Recently, while looking at a medical report, I came across a genetic test performed because a patient's mother had breast cancer. The purpose was to understand whether the patient had inherited a genetic change that could increase her risk of developing the disease. That made me curious. If genetic testing can help identify an inherited risk of breast cancer, what about other diseases? Are there tests that can identify a person's susceptibility to diabetes, heart disease, neurological disorders, or inherited blood disorders? Can we discover certain risks before symptoms appear and take steps to prevent a disease or detect it early? Another question came to my mind. Traditional medical systems such as Siddha and Ayurveda have their own ways of understanding individual constitution, health, and disease susceptibility. Modern medicine, meanwhile, can examine our DNA and identify certain genetic variations associated...