Urinary free beta hCG, beta core fragment and total oestriol as markers of Down syndrome in the second trimester of pregnancy

Detection of maternal serum hCG glycoform variants in the second trimester of pregnancies affected by Down syndrome using a lectin immunoassay

“…Retrospective and prospective studies over the past decade have achieved detection rates of 65 to 75% for a 5% false positive rate (Wald et al, 1997;Spencer, 1999 Attempts to improve Down syndrome detection rates have been ongoing in recent years, and one avenue has focused on the measurement of urine metabolites of hCG. Initial studies with urine β-core (hCGβcf) (Cuckle et al, 1994(Cuckle et al, , 1995 showed considerable promise with a median in cases with Down syndrome of around six Multiples of the Median (MoM); however this initial optimism has not been sustained, with more extensive studies showing much poorer discrimination (Hsu et al, 1999;Cuckle et al, 1999a). Cole et al (1997) initially reported increased levels of hyperglycosylated variants of hCG in urine from women carrying a fetus affected by Down syndrome.…”