PRENATAL-DIAGNOSIS IN PORTUGAL

On practical terms we can say that prenatal diagnosis (PND) only start ed in Portugal in 1984 after the Abortion Act was approved by Parliame nt. Since then the demand for PND has been increasing, but we realise that the coverage of high-risk pregnancies as well as screening for fe tal abnormalities in the general population are below the desirable le vels. Among the factors that contribute to this we can mention the bad planning in some services, the low standard of ultrasound scans in th e low-risk pregnancies, the small number of public cytogenetics labora tories performing fetal karyotyping, the scarcity of genetic counsello rs and last but not least the inadequate limit of 16 weeks for termina tion of pregnancies in case of fetal malformation.