The Friday Five – This Week in Precision Medicine

With healthcare technology changing and improving everyday, precision medicine (PM), the medical model proposing customizing healthcare, including an individualized tailoring of all medical decisions, practices, and products to every patient, is also on the rise. Today’s Friday Five includes everything you need to currently know about precision medicine.

Precision Medicine and Population Health: Dealing With the Elephant in the Room
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (@CDCgov) addresses both the enthusiasm and skepticism the new U.S. precision medicine initiative is sparking.  Keeping in mind the key question: will precision medicine improve population health…they provide commentary of the initiative including an outline of both sides of the argument. 

Getting it RIGHT – Individualized Medicine is Getting Very Personal
In an attempt to provide better healthcare for all, The Mayo Clinic (@MayoClinic) is gathering personalized information for 10,000 patients in order to study each individual’s genetic make-up.  Check out the article by Elizabeth Zimmermann Young about the RIGHT (Right Drug, Right Dose, Right Time: Using Genomic Data to Individualize Treatment) Protocol.

Will Precision Medicine Improve Population Health?
Muin J. Khoury, MD, PhD (@DrKhouryCDC) and Sandro Galea, MD, DrPH (@sandrogalea) provide their response to the precision medicine initiative in The Journal of the American Medical Association. (@JAMA_current) Their thoughts include three reasons why precision medicine might not improve the health of populations and three reasons why it might. 

Uncle Sam Wants You — Or at Least Your Genetic and Lifestyle Information
Scientists working for the United States Government are looking for one million volunteers to become members of the “precision medicine cohort.” Read all about this ambitious 10-year research project in an article by Robert Pair in the New York Times @nytimes.

Study Of Breast Cancer Treatment Reveals Paradox Of Precision Medicine
In nine nations across Europe, 6,600 women participated in a study to see if a genetic test called MammaPrint could help reduce the overtreatment of chemotherapy in early-stage breast cancer patients. National Public Radio @NPRHealth analyzes the study and raises the important point that precision does not always equal certainty.