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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2015 Nov 1.
Published in final edited form as: Epilepsia. 2014 Sep 29;55(11):1705–1713. doi: 10.1111/epi.12810

Table 1.

Proportion of individuals who would “definitely” or “probably” want to have genetic testing in a scenario with 100% penetrance and clinical utility, by demographic, genetic attribution, and epilepsy-related variables

Predictors Individuals with epilepsy Biological relatives without epilepsy

Na % Definitely/probably yes p-valueb Na % Definitely/probably yes p-valueb
All participants 143 85.0 -- 165 74.2 --
Female 87 93.8 <0.001 95 72.2 0.74
Male 56 71.2 Ref. 70 76.9 Ref.
Age <40 years 28 92.9 0.27 38 81.6 0.14
Age 40–59 years 69 82.6 0.77 74 74.3 0.55
Age ≥60 years 46 84.8 Ref. 53 69.8 Ref.
Do not have children 49 89.8 Ref. 40 75.0 Ref.
Have children 91 82.4 0.24 123 75.6 0.93
College graduate or higher 77 84.0 0.75 92 81.3 0.11
Less than college graduate 65 86.0 Ref. 73 64.1 Ref.
Catholic 29 80.8 0.41 54 64.3 0.25
Protestant 48 88.9 0.78 49 81.0 0.59
Otherc 29 82.1 0.44 30 78.6 1.00
None/Atheist/Prefer not to say 29 88.9 Ref. 30 78.6 Ref.
Opinion of role of genetics in causing epilepsy in familyd
 Medium/big 108 87.6 0.17 112 78.0 0.39
 None/small 33 76.5 Ref. 45 68.4 Ref.
Opinion of chance has a mutationd
 Moderate/high 78 88.7 0.15 64 86.9 0.001
 None/small/don’t know 62 81.4 Ref. 101 66.0 Ref.
Focal epilepsy 80 87.5 0.29
Generalized epilepsy 34 79.4 Ref.
Last seizure <1 year ago 35 91.4 0.21
Last seizure ≥1 year ago 84 84.5 Ref.
Lifetime number of seizures
 ≤20 63 82.5 Ref.
 21–100 24 79.2 0.72
 >100 29 96.6 0.02
 Unknown 27 85.2 0.73
a

Total Ns vary among different variables because of missing data.

b

p-value from robust Poisson regression with generalized estimating equations, compared with reference group (denoted by Ref.).

c

Affected individuals: 10 identified as Jewish, 1 Hindu, 1 Buddhist, and 17 “Other.” Unaffected individuals: 6 identified as Jewish, 1 Buddhist, and 23 “Other.”

d

Genetic attribution assessed by responses to the questions, “In your opinion, how big a role has genetics had in causing the epilepsy in your family?” and “In your opinion, what do you think the chances are that you have a change or mutation in a gene that affects risk for epilepsy?”