Article posted: 12/3/2012 6:00 AM

New DNA techniques end mystery of what ails baby Patrick

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New techniques in gene sequencing helped the family of Patrick Butters solve a 36-year medical mystery that also affected his mother, Melissa.

Courtesy of Butters family

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New techniques in gene sequencing helped the family of Patrick Butters solve a 36-year medical mystery.

Courtesy of Butters family

Wendy Chung, a geneticist at Columbia University, says it's just a matter of time until genetic sequencing "becomes a first-line test for babies with undiagnosed disorders."

Courtesy of Columbia University

About this Article

Chris Butters was changing a diaper for his son, Patrick, last November when he felt something in the two-month-old's abdomen. It was about the size of a marble or a peanut M&M candy. "What in the world is that?" he recalled thinking. Butters and his wife, Melissa, suspected the growth in Patrick's abdomen was a new chapter in a 36-year-old medical mystery that began in the 1970s, when Melissa herself was a little girl battling unexplained tumors.