Gene therapy and why it is needed

Delivering gene therapy to the foetus directly when it is still in the womb is something which has been a major achievement in the field of medical science. Studies have revealed that pregnant woman can also be a test subject for research which are directed to gene therapy and one can have several experiments on early onset of foetal growth restrictions on them.

Gene therapy is something which is still a matter of research in many branches of medical science. But fetal gene therapy prenatal is mainly needed in order to avoid certain genetic disorders which affect the newborns and sometimes it becomes very severe. Though many of those conditions are pretty rare but if one adds them together then the genetic condition that appears is pretty commonly seen. So, this research will lead to a situation where a mother expecting a child will get to learn early if their expected baby has any kind of genetic disorders or not. As the research grows more, the doctors will be more aware on how to treat the process and how one should go ahead with a foetal gene therapy medically.

Now the first question that comes to mind is what exactly is a gene therapy? Well, at present, gene therapy is something which is used as a treatment method on adults and children which adds some genes to the specific body cells. Sometimes soon, by this therapy one will also be able to remove some particular genes from body cells as well. Here, body cells mean somatic cells. These cells only comprise various tissues present in the body but they do not include any kind of reproductive cells like sperm in men and eggs in women. As they never include a human gametes it never affects the patient’s children and their descendants in any way. This gene therapy is said to be very effective in correcting some blood diseases like Haemophilia B. It is also capable of curing diseases like liver problems and other organ problems.

Delivering a gene to a particular organ or to a fetus always requires a proper carrier like a virus. The virus that works here best is called AAV and they have a very limited carrying capacity. With the help of these, only small genes can be delivered through the human body. but sometimes large genes also create problems and genetic disorders gets prominence due to that.  Then other methods have to be taken and measures are taken to transfer it. They are mainly done with the help of editing system and the therapists keep editing small parts of the genes one by one in order to rectify it. This process not only includes gene repairs but sometime gene replacements as well.

One can always go for a fetal gene therapy but before that one should definitely have a long discussion with their gynaecologist on whether it is necessary to do that or not. without an expert opinion, it will be not s good idea to for a gene therapy.