Policy & Standards
Quality Assurance
Quality assurance is the backbone of our organization. We utilize the latest technology, alongside certified clinical diagnostic laboratories (CLIA) highly experienced in the genetics field, which employ the most extensive, complex, and expensive molecular DNA methodologies available. All screening is supervised by senior inspectors from beginning to end. Procedures and equipment adhere to the international ISO code 15189:2003 of professional labs.
Every step of the testing, screening, and data entry process is done under rigorous, multi-level and redundant quality controls. Test kits are bar coded to guarantee correct matching of results to participants.
Dor Yeshorim laboratories and staff follow strict established protocols for analyzing, retrieving, and providing compatibility information. Additionally, we implement our own quality assurance protocols such as including samples with previously known results in every batch of blood samples being sent for genetic analysis.
Dor Yeshorim’s highly regulated, confidential system ensures that the personal information of the vast, worldwide population we screen is fully protected. In fact, the entire system operates by way of identification numbers as opposed to names.
We take our responsibility extremely seriously; lives literally hang in the balance.
Dor Yeshorim’s Testing Policy:
Dor Yeshorim’s testing policy was developed with extreme care, under the guidance and support of leading genetics experts and rabbinical authorities. Diseases are added to the Dor Yeshorim panels in conjunction with the recommendations of the ACMG (American College of Medical Genetics) the Israeli Health Ministry, and our Medical Advisory Board. Every disease for which we currently test has been painstakingly researched, scrutinized and evaluated to ensure it meets the necessary criteria.
Our policy is to test only for common, incurable recessive diseases which present serious health issues or risk of fatality and for which there exists reliable testing methods with definitive carrier status results. These policies, along with our strict confidentiality rule, is what sets us apart from all other genetic screening services. The diseases on the Ashkenazic standard and optional panels as well as the diseases on the Sephardic panel all meet these criteria.
While other screening services may seem more inclusive with a long list of diseases, as per worldwide genetic experts, more is indeed less. The simple explanation is that for many genetic mutations, the manifestation of the actual disease and the
symptoms associated with it, are not clear-cut. In addition, based on research in which Dor Yeshorim has, and continues to play an integral role, unless a test can be deemed reliable and carrier status confirmed, subjecting the population to disclosed carrier status that is ambiguous at best, is contrary to our mission to help make matches, not break them. The tests we do conduct have been determined to be in our community’s best interests.
The mere existence of a genetic disease should not result in its inclusion within a testing panel. The lack of scientific data to provide definitive answers as to carrier status, results in moral, ethical and potential medical dilemmas to which there are no easy answers. What is one to do with an inconclusive carrier status?
Dor Yeshorim is determined to find answers and reliable testing methods for as many recessive genetic diseases as possible. To that end, we utilize our extensive database as well as our more than three decades of experience serving the Jewish community. It is why we spend millions of dollars annually to conduct extensive research, in collaboration with other industry experts, to unravel the genetic mysteries involved.
