You know body consists off 37. 2 trillion cells and each cell contains our Genetic Information and if just one single gene is not working right it can have men disappear cations on our health how genes control all life this is what im going to talk about with professor. Whos the director of the institute of human and medical genetics of the britain and who is a researcher here at the Mechanics Institute for molecular genetics welcome to get checked. For the tick tests going to far reaching consequences so before you do a genetic test get informed what it really means and. Talk to your doctor. Some diseases can actually be caused by genes take colon cancer or Breast Cancer for example some special forms can be inherited is simple blood test can tell you if youre affected. And i go to is a retired physician for a long time he didnt know that he has an unusually high risk of getting a certain kind of cancer. Its a genetic risk he was born way of. The 21st moment or when i was 20 my mother died of metal started colon cancer. While she was in hospital she warned my sister and me that we might get it too. And that it might be genetic and didnt gain an illegal. Like his mother white or studied medicine but he didnt remember her warning until some of his own patients who had the disease reminded him. Quite a began to go for regular checkups and for many years everything was fine when examining doctors found no sign of the disease he felt relieved and assumed he didnt have any unusual genetic risk but then he was diagnosed with colon cancer. When i was 43 i had a colonoscopy and they found i had cancer of the cold on them. They were able to remove it surgically so i didnt need came a therapy humor to appear. At that point of white or decided he wanted to know whether his disease had a genetic component he wondered if he might have passed the risk on to his own 4 children. The doctor turned a patient went to Munich Center of medical genetics he wanted to know if he carried a genetic variation associated with increased risk of colon cancer. Many experts say that its a wise choice to make in situations like his. There are a whole range of genetic diseases where it makes sense to identify the risks for example Hereditary Cancer syndrome so familial my upper thirtys that can manifest in adults especially with regards to cancer is genetic testing allows you to estimate the risk of developing a disease and in which quite accurately then a screening plan can be developed for the family. Tests look for mutations in specific genes in cells taken from a sample of blood. From mutations are ones that are known to be associated with specific diseases. Another kind of genetic testing is gaining in popularity you just send in a saliva sample to a commercial provider Many Companies advertise the Service Online they claim to be able to detect increased risk for over 200. 00 diseases all from no price but unlike in targeted genetic testing most of these commercial providers dont search for highly specific inherited mutations instead they look for d. N. A. Variations that are statistically associated with risk for diseases like alzheimers and diabetes. These diseases this certainly caused by a number of genetic defects there we havent identified them all yet and we dont have any idea which specific combinations of defects lead to which risks given the current state of knowledge these tests cant offer valid results but they can scare patients and they can also give them a false sense of security. Test revealed that he carries genetic mutations linked to colon cancer and that he has an 80 percent likelihood of getting it he inherited the genes from his mother. When they heard about the results his 4 children also chose to take the test. Unfortunately it turns out that 2 of my sons are also at risk of getting colon cancer but they go regularly to get screened the others dont have the mutation thank god. Knowing you have an elevated risk of disease influences the way you live regardless of whether the disease ever manifests so its wise to think carefully before deciding to go through with genetic testing. Have you thought if im going to see the head of the department of medical genetics of the brain in Charity Thanks for having me today we just saw in the report a patient who suffered from colon cancer and he wanted to find out if theres some genetic causes for that so so its very frequent that people suffer from colon cancer or Breast Cancer with a genetic cause we think its about 4 to 6 percent of all individuals that have either a call on Breast Cancer that suffer from more not genetic diseases or they have a specific defect that increases their risk to get this type of cancer and can the patient himself tell that this is kind of a genetic disease of any signs or symptoms for that now that cant really tell it themselves i mean the only thing that we can say there are certain criteria that are make it suspicious for example early age the order that you get you know you get the greater your chances are that you get cancer at some stage but if you get cancer at 30 or 40 or 50 years of age then you know this is more suspicious that it may however a genetic cause and genetic cause means that in heritage so what about the volume the father for instance or the uncle of the mother is it a sign as well if there are a lot of family members who are affected that certainly is a sign of inheritance if theyre more than 2 affected and if one of the affected dizzee younger than 50 and that for example would be something suspicious so. If there are several of family members who have checked by say colon cancer up Breast Cancer which you advise to get tested i would advise that you get the genetic counseling so that someone can explain to you what these tests mean and also you know you can one can discuss the pedigree and can see if this is really. Falls into the same category of the type of cancer that you think is suspicious for genetic cause or not and other tests very accurate the tests themselves are very accurate if your eye tests you i can tell you whether you have a mutation or not what we cannot tell exactly is when and. You know really if you will get the disease or not we can only give you a certain percentage there are some Internet Services especially in the United States of america where you can as a patient just buy those tests over the internet with no consultation at all so how do you judge those kinds of tests well the problem i think with many of these tests is that do you think its good test that you know the individual who sends off the test doesnt even know that they get tested because theyve never heard of these diseases and they have no idea so they might get a result back for something that they certainly didnt want to know and that is what we do with the genetic counseling is that you tell people what does it means and what the consequences of this test and you dont get that of course if you just send away your sample via the internet and the consequence is i think its a good point because if you test for the genetic risk for say cancer you can apply other tests like a colonoscopy for instance to see if the patients getting cancer and you can even change your life or some Lifestyle Changes like like being becoming a vegetarian also to prevent colon cancer but what about diseases like alzheimers disease which cannot be preventable well fod someone there also are certain genetic risks but they are not they dont increase your risk as much as for example for better or for the call long or Breast Cancer genes and this kind of risk or incur. These and risk is rather moderate and i would not advise. To get this tested at the moment so what about prenatal testing say testing embryos inside the blue well thats of course possible and we also do this. In germany there is a special law and i think we are pretty much the only country in the world that has this where we are not allowed to test a disease that only breaks out after the age of 18 and the idea behind this is that every person should decide for him or herself whether they want to know this kind of information when they want to have this information on the market so if there are diseases in adulthood which occur after the age of 18 and they run in the family you should consider yourself getting tested. The Schuster Family have grown especially close in recent years thats because the mother martina has been battling cancer for over a decade it began with Breast Cancer. She always talked to us very openly about it letting us know her current state of health she didnt keep anything a secret for this well that was very important to me ready. You know eventually recovered from the Breast Cancer but then 7 years later she was diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer. Was it all just a coincidence or a fate determined by her genes. Remember that her grandmother had died very young probably as a result of Breast Cancer. Doesnt have mathematics and my dad was only 7 years old at the time that he thought there was also talk that she might have had Ovarian Cancer too. Such experiences are typical in families with hereditary breast and Ovarian Cancer. Dr manion has pursued Extensive Research into this gene linked cancer and says it strikes women in those families especially often and at an especially young age. As images. Following the average age of women with this type of Breast Cancer is 4445 depending on what gene mutation they have thats very young the average age for Breast Cancer otherwise is around 65 so 20 years later by from. Natasha i got my ass known for the past 2 years that she has the brock a one gene mutation make you know more likely to develop Breast Cancer. She had to fight for a long time to get the d. N. A. Test done. For years i was told you have a large family so its normal to have a lot of them die. Mother died of Ovarian Cancer and 7 of her mothers 9 siblings likewise lost their lives to cancer. Part of the women fell victim to breast or Ovarian Cancer. Test storm. Because in the end i only managed to get the test because so many people in my family had died. Dysfunctions it was a really strange feeling that it was basically their deaths that paved the way for me to live on even taught. Her than hopefully ill now be saved from getting cancer vita king khan and deceitful life and interests for sean plight. After testing positive and immediately had her ovaries and both of her breasts removed a family understood her decision and supported her but many friends were shocked. Mentioned some people burst into tears when i told them they said it was so terrible. That i said it would be terrible if i developed cancer. When on his long as i dont have cancer its well not exactly brilliant sure but at least i have a chance now. The how we can show us. Other members of natashas family could now also be tested if they chose to they have a 5050 chance of having the mutated gene as well but some people prefer not to know. In addition to prophylactic surgery those who test positive can also opt for more regular Cancer Screening that wont stop the almost developing of course but an early diagnosis could at least improve the chances of survival. East west india finding out you have this gene mutation isnt easy to deal with this so that needs to be given careful thought before you go for the test what will you do if the result is positive how will you tell your children or siblings lots of people decide theyd rather not know and you have to respect that. Just speak to your own. Martina schusters daughter very you know got herself tested undiscovered she does not have the gene mutation Martina Suncor binion on the other hand decided not to have the test this currently no effective Breast Cancer screening for men of his age so he decided he was better off not knowing. The patient we just saw in our report and that was getting genetically tested because there were a lot of family members who had Ovarian Cancer and Breast Cancer in my office i sometimes see patients with different kinds of cancer in the family can this also be inherited well what we generally i think have to consider is that cancer is a common disease a relatively common disease so everyone will have someone or know someone who within the wider family will have suffered from cancer i guess but nevertheless they are indeed families that have a relatively high occurrence of different types of cancers so for those families we think it has a genetic origin but because they are due to many different types of genes it is very difficult at the moment to test. And we cannot really do reliable testing to give you a risk for these kinds of families ok so we just talked about the testing and theres Something Like gene with head of p. As well so whats there in the pipeline in gene therapy we are its really a new type of therapy that is coming up now because now we can actually edit genomes that means we can change them we can cut things out we can put new sequences in and the idea is that we can actually change and sort of put the normal sequence back in and by that. Heal the patient or at least support. These patients in their recovery but you do this in Adult Patients and you taking out stem cells. That is the idea for example one can take out blood cells and use the stem cells genetically modify them and then give them back to the to the patient in november there was a worldwide outcry because some chinese scientists claimed that their genes edited babies so so what was that about this was about gene editing actually in the very early stage of the embryo when they are only a few cells and what you can do then what they claim what they have done is that you do exactly the same kind of technology put them to change the embryo and in this case you change more or less probably the entire genetic makeup so every single cell so if you human being eventually develops all of this embryo this human being will have. More or less complete to come completely changed genome and the major difference of course that is that this person will pass this on to the next generation but but if we put the ethics aside and if you just focus on the scientific things and the genetic editing of babies and the genetic editing of stem cells is it more or less the same i mean technically i think its more or less the same because it didnt use the same type of technology you can cut the you know you can put new pieces in and take others out so technically those i think no difference and in the quarter you think do you think that an editing old gene some stem cells could be some kind of weapon against say cancer in the future i think it can because its a really Fascinating Technology where we can change genomes in a way that we could have not you know even thought about a few years ago so the technology is a real advance and i think it will certainly help to treat some diseases cancer but also inherited diseases thanks so much for this very interesting talk welcome and if youve got any questions you like me to ask our experts be sure to write me an email. In good shape your Weekly Health show on d w that covers many aspects of health can we look at whats new in medical treatment nutrition fitness and beauty we just cussed these topics in depth with specialists and offer you opportunities to pace your questions so get in touch. Do you know the situation youre lying in bed if youre counting 1000 sheep and sleep simply wont count it happens to a lot of people sleeplessness but there are plenty of tricks and tips and they dont even involve sheep. Detrain has just had a really good nights sleep a room was completely darkened and very quiet. Now shes ready to go out and enjoy nature. But the main reason shes here is to attend a seminar about sleep and relaxation. His father my you know. I had the feeling i wasnt sleeping very well because we were given testing devices here to use for 2 nights and i discovered that i slept better than i expected but it was a big relief to learn that. Sleep tight the last thing many people say to each other before bed and its also the name of the seminar designed to teach stressed city dwellers how to get some healthy shuteye participants come for Different Reasons mentioned above ofsted if the people who work are often under pressure to perform people who do shift work often have particular problems with that but so do people who have a normal work life. And we also get retired people who finally have the time to deal with their sleeping problems its high time that. Everyone tends to put off the issue and they just hope that tonight theyll be able to get some decent sleep. But some participants here have trouble getting used to the quiet in the old Country House the rooms have been completely refurbished to offer ideal sleeping conditions. She often had voice sleep has a lot to do with a feeling of comfort a sense of being secure beds and box spring bed this wonderful bed is a box spring and the mattress adjusts perfectly to the body that is to your body weight. Mentioned if we turn the mattress over we can even make a very comfortable bed for someone whos very heavy on top are and we have a topper that lets you sink into the bed and find your ideal sleeping position. Its all infinite but in the seminar sleep isnt everything its also about relaxation and that requires movement to. Some of the guests dont take part in the exercise they choose their mattresses and pillows. And they can go cycling make pottery or even chop wood before going to bed. Has taken some of the ideas back to her own bedroom. To say oh its a target and so i now adays in our fast moving world lots of people use their cell pho