Racial minority group interest in direct-to-consumer genetic testing: findings from the PGen study

Latrice Landry; Daiva Elena Nielsen; Deanna Alexis Carere; J Scott Roberts; Robert C Green; PGen Study Group

doi:10.1007/s12687-017-0325-5

Racial minority group interest in direct-to-consumer genetic testing: findings from the PGen study

J Community Genet. 2017 Oct;8(4):293-301. doi: 10.1007/s12687-017-0325-5. Epub 2017 Sep 4.

Authors

Latrice Landry^{1

2

3}, Daiva Elena Nielsen^{2

4

5}, Deanna Alexis Carere⁶, J Scott Roberts⁷, Robert C Green^{8

9

10

11

12}; PGen Study Group

Affiliations

¹ Department of Pathology, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
² Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
³ Partners Personalized Medicine, Boston, MA, USA.
⁴ Division of Genetics, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
⁵ Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA.
⁶ Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada.
⁷ Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
⁸ Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA. rcgreen@bwh.harvard.edu.
⁹ Partners Personalized Medicine, Boston, MA, USA. rcgreen@bwh.harvard.edu.
¹⁰ Division of Genetics, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA. rcgreen@bwh.harvard.edu.
¹¹ Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA. rcgreen@bwh.harvard.edu.
¹² Partners Personalized Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, EC Alumnae Building, Suite 301, 41 Avenue Louis Pasteur, Boston, MA, 02115, USA. rcgreen@bwh.harvard.edu.

Abstract

There is little information regarding direct-to-consumer (DTC) personal genetic testing (PGT) in non-White racial minorities. Using a web-based survey, we compared the pretest interests and attitudes toward DTC-PGT of racial minority and White DTC-PGT customers of 23andMe and Pathway Genomics using chi-square tests and multinomial regression. Data were available for 1487 participants (1389 White, 44 Black, and 54 Asian). Survey responses were similar across racial groups, although a greater proportion of Blacks compared to Whites reported being "very interested" in genetic information related to traits (91.9 vs. 70.8%, p = 0.009). A greater proportion of Asians compared to Whites reported that a "very important" consideration for pursuing DTC-PGT was limited information about their family health history (58.0 vs. 37.5%, p = 0.002). While a number of significant differences between groups were observed in unadjusted analyses, they did not remain significant after adjustment. This study provides a preliminary view of the interests for purchasing DTC-PGT among customers with racial minority backgrounds.

Keywords: Asians; Blacks; Direct-to-consumer; Genetic testing; Interests and attitudes; Racial minorities.

Abstract

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