Maternal weight differences do not explain ethnic differences in biochemical screening.

In previous work, we and others have shown that serum levels of alpha-fetoprotein, human chorionic gonadotropin, and estriol vary among the four commonly defined racial/ethnic groups seen in the United States: white, African-American, Asian, and Hispanic. We have suggested that better sensitivity and specificity could improve screening sensitivity and specificity. However, it has been argued that systematic weight differences among the groups could explain the variation. We evaluated the results from 208,257 patients having screening and found systematic weight differences. However, these differences were not as large as the racial/ethnic differences, showing that weight does not fully explain the discrepancy, and, therefore, four separate data bases give more accurate results.