Tuesday December 23, 2008
Drive to build twin database
By CHRISTINA KOH
IPOH: Studying the mysterious nature of twins, their physical similarities, attitudes and behaviour could play an important role in fighting diseases, said Dr Shayesteh Jahanfar.
The director of Malaysia’s newly formed National Malaysian Twin Registry (NMTR), said studying twins could also help solve many of life’s mysteries, such as how far genes influence a person’s traits and behaviour.
And she is now on a mission to get more Malaysian twins to register with the non-profit organisation.
“I once had a pair of identical female twins in my class and I couldn’t tell them apart,” said Dr Shayesteh, a Perak Royal College of Medicine-Universiti Kuala Lumpur lecturer, who became the NMTR director after the organisation was approved in June.
She is no stranger to the topic as she has worked with twins since 1991 and even submitted her PhD thesis on “Twins and Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome” when she graduated in Australia.
Dr Shayesteh, an Iranian, first established the Iran National Twin Registry at the Avecina Research Centre using a World Health Organisation grant in 2002. It now has 20,000 registered twins.
Dr Shayesteh said that besides the twins, family members could greatly benefit from the registry by having access to health information, parenting advice and be part of a national community of twins and triplets.
To encourage twins to sign up, the NMTR is organising a lucky draw for the first 100 adult pairs to register, as well as fun activities like photography competitions for the little ones.
So far, only 34 pairs of adults and 53 pairs of children have signed up with the NMTR.
For details and registration, check out their official website (www.nmtr.org.my) or contact Dr Shayesteh through 05-546 9715 or SMS to 012-550 1305.
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