Cystic fibrosis heterozygote screening in the Orthodox Community of Ashkenazi Jews: the Dor Yesharim approach and heterozygote frequency

Abstract

In the community of the Orthodox Jews most of the marriages are arranged a screening program that is aimed at preventing the marriage of two carriers of autosomal recessive disorders is conducted by the Dor Yesharim organization. A random sample of 6,076 individuals of the Orthodox Jewish Ashkenazi community, were screened for the five mutations common in Ashkenazi patients (delta F508, W1282X, G542X, N1303K, 3849 + 10Kb C-->T). Two hundred thirty-two carriers were identified, giving a heterozygote frequency of 1:26. The relative frequencies of the individual mutations in the general population were comparable to those in the patients.