By Jayden Lee and Zachary Brooks on November 10, 2023
Imagine a set of twins who have a family history of migraines. They both go to the pharmacy and pick up the migraine medication prescribed by the doctor. The prescription works for one twin, but the second still has a migraine. A variety of factors drive such a phenomenon: how quickly the person metabolizes the drug, if the twin has a sensitivity to that medication, and other factors.
Such differences happen because the recommended dosages are derived from clinical trials. Said clinical trials work on a population level, where they focus on preventing complications and improving health outcomes for the specific patient populations in the studies. This format results in effective dosages for medications, while minimizing side effects. However, such large trials do not account for individual variability within the study population.
Precision medicine has begun addressing part of this issue by examining an individual’s genetics. For example, genetic testing looks at a patient’s individual genes to flag the patient’s potential risks for a variety of disease states, ranging from cardiovascular disease to hypertension to colon cancer. Genetic testing companies – like 23andMe and Ancestry — look at particular genes in a person’s DNA to determine one’s risks for developing diseases. To accomplish this, companies use various testing methodologies, most commonly PCR tests, which look for specific genes known to correlate with particular diseases.
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Learn more about UGenome’s Personalized Medication Service, ProPEx, or contact UGenome. You can also find case studies for UGenome’s bioinformatics services Metabolite Identification, Bone Metastasis Risk Analysis in Breast Cancer, Survival Analysis with gene signatures in cancer
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