Premarital Checkup
- Marriage is the fundamental building block of society, and the cornerstone in building emotional, healthy and family relationships.
- The healthy marriage guarantees preventing the family members from the hereditary and infectious diseases; thus building a happy and stable family.
- Healthy marriage is defined as state of agreement and harmony between the marriage partners with regard to the healthy, psychological, sexual, social, and legislative aspects, aiming at making a sound family and begetting healthy children.
Premarital Screening:-
- Premarital screening is defined as testing couples who are planning to get married soon for common genetic blood disorders (e.g. sickle cell anemia and thalassemia and sickle cell anemia) and infectious diseases (e.g. hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS).
- The premarital screening aims to give medical consultation on the odds of transmitting the abovementioned diseases to the other partner/spouse or children and to provide partners/spouses with options that help them plan for healthy family.
Objectives of Premarital Screening Program:-
- Limiting the spread of some genetic blood diseases (e.g. sickle-cell anemia and thalassemia) and infectious diseases (e.g. hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS).
- Promoting awareness about the concept of the comprehensive healthy marriage.
- Reducing pressure over health institutions and blood banks.
- Avoiding the social and psychological problems for families whose children suffer.
- Reducing the family and community’s financial burdens of treating the injured persons.
Tests that constitute Premarital Screening:-
- Routine Investigations: – Complete Blood Count (CBC), Complete Urine Analysis and Peripheral Blood Smears to check for normal and abnormal cells.
Blood group testing (ABO-RH) is important to screen out the Rh-negative women and counsel them about the risks in pregnancy
- Tests for Infectious Diseases:-
- VDRL for Syphilis Testing
- – HIV I & II
- – Hepatitis-B Screening
- – Hepatitis-C Virus
- Genetic Tests:-Doctors usually go for culture-based genetic screening. Depending on your family history and ancestry, different tests are designed for different disorders like thalassemia
