In the early 2000’s the human genome project was discovered, which opened the eyes of scientists to a new era of medical practice, which is precision medicine. A ‘’one-size-fits-all’’ approach which was dominant is successful in some patients but not all, as time pass it is being replaced with precision medicine. 

What is precision medicine?

Precision medicine is the approach where scientists involve the understanding of genetic information encoded in the human genome, to provide the best possible diagnosis, treatment and even preventive measures that is unique for every individual. In addition to genetic information, the individual environment and lifestyle can be taken into account too.

 Thus, precision medicine is not merely about providing a unique approach for every patient, it aims to reduce undesirable side effects of the treatments, resulting in an increase in the quality provided by the healthcare.

How can precision medicine be achieved?

After the first human genome project, currently, gene sequencing happens faster (within hours) with cheaper value. This has increased the amount of data respectively, making it essential to interpret the data through computational techniques, such as bioinformatics and other new analytical methods using machine learning and artificial intelligence that can result in patterns of health and diseases. 

Other data inputs are the multi-omics that allow scientists to investigate the complex molecular changes causing diseases or affecting the response to treatments, through bioinformatics and artificial intelligence new insights can be revealed in selecting the right drug target. Multi-omics consists of transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics and others. 

Moreover, a precision medicine ecosystem should be able to link patients, clinical laboratories, researchers and providers. Gathering the data in these sectors that is not only genomic related data, but also family history, environmental exposures and others. This integration of data will result in spreading knowledge to other sectors, forming a complete picture to deliver the best health related decisions to every individual. Nevertheless, the generated data will be available for future research projects too.

This ecosystem also include governments, stakeholders and policy makers, who will support the precision medicine research and address the confidentiality and privacy of the data.

Precision medicine challenges

• The existing unknown domains in the human genome
• The challenges in collecting and analyzing the large amounts of ‘’omics’’ data
• Economic challenges

Precision medicine future outlook

The amount of information to be known from genomics (multi-omics) field are massive and it becomes more accessible with time, thanks to the new technologies, but, understanding this information and interpreting the data produced is the needed part; resulting in increasing the quality of cost-effective healthcare, increasing the targeted therapy that will reduce the undesirable side effects.

Regarding the previously listed challenges, they can be overcomed by the effort of scientists in the fields of bioinformatics, data analysis, software development, genetic counseling and more of the multidisciplinary fields needed in precision medicine. 

For all the young scientists, precision medicine is a hot topic in science and will stay to be for the coming years, Phi science institute offers a special bioinformatics course for those interested to pave your way in precision medicine, do not hesitate to take this chance and register to learn more about this vast science! 

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