ALS is a disease I’m concerned about. I’m curious how likely I am to have it in the future.?
My grandmother died of ALS, she had 7 children and of those 7 my mom was the only one that we know of to have ALS. She had two children and I’m curious if either of us have a high risk of having ALS in the future. I’m only 20 now but i’m looking into what I can do to find out more about ALS and genetic testing. Please let me know if any of you have an idea about ALS or have experience and have more knowledge about this. Thank you so much!
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Generally speaking, not genetic, but given the 2 cases in your family there might be something. You could possibly have genetic testing - but it's up to you to decide if it would be a good thing or bad thing.Here's the genetic info from the ALS Association's website http://www.alsa.org/als-care/resources/publication...
I'm just going to throw in, as an example, that both my grandmothers had colon cancer (one died from it), my brother got it at age 40 (survived), my mother got it in a string of unrelated cancers later in her life, and we have been told that there is almost a certainty of my mother having a genetic disease (she died before having genetic testing). I could certainly be tested (though it's very expensive) and learn whether or not I have that particular predisposition, but there is pretty much nothing I can do with that knowledge except worry! Not for me.
In most cases ALS is NOT hereditary.
My friend had this we call it MND in the UK. It is NOT genetic.