Personalized Medicine

Applications of genetic information to make individualized treatment choices is increasing. High volume pharmacogenetic testing in specialty practices (e.g., oncology, HIV/AIDS and psychiatry) and the emergence of consumer genomics companies is evidenced recently. Despite increased awareness, pharmacogenetics has been relatively slow in becoming incorporated into mainstream medicine.

What determines whether a particular treatment, a particular drug is effective or leads to severe side effects is our genes. As everybody have slightly different genes they have slightly different responses to treatments and drugs. Personalized medicine holds the promise of tailored medical treatments based on genetic information, rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) funds several molecule-screening centers in the United States to rapidly test a library of chemicals against specific proteins. The screening is targeted to the mechanisim of drug disease interactions. Scripps Florida operates one of the four centers.

Burnham operates a second of those NIH molecule-screening centers. Currently, its screening output can tackle half a million chemicals in one day, but the new system being developed in Orlando will be able to handle as many as 2.2 million chemicals a day.

With the advances in informatics technology theoretically all gene-drug interactions can be studied. However, the very same approach can be applied to gene-toxin interactions and can help to determine fine tuned toxins for targeted individuals or populations. Specific killing agents, in other words. A potential for targeted chemical-biological drugs also lies in the technology.

It depends on for what we are using the double sided blade. For a murder or for a delicate surgery ?