[Possibilities and limitations of genetic family counseling (author's transl)].

Genetic family counseling has gained increasing importance in Germany in recent years, although the material and in particular the personnel requirements are lacking to a considerable extent. It requires careful training and a high sense of responsibility. Wrong advice is worse than none. Besides the "classical" genetic family counseling--before founding a family, after the birth of a sick child, disease in the family, childlessness (eg frequent abortions), elderly parents, particularly mothers, before entering marriage with a blood relation--the individual genetic prognosis and prophylaxis (genetic individual prognosis) should be included more extensively in the "genetic prevention"--which is more than "just" a family counseling. This is particularly true of many frequently polygenic multifactorially induced diseases in general and internal medicine.