Pharmacogenomics is the study of how an individual's genetic profile affects their response to medications. It aims to provide the right drug at the right dose for the right patient by understanding genetic factors. Current applications include testing for genetic variants before prescribing certain drugs to avoid bad reactions. Challenges include accounting for both genetic and environmental influences on drug responses and protecting patient privacy. As understanding and technologies improve, pharmacogenomics may help develop new drugs and reduce trial-and-error prescribing.

1. PHARMACOGENOMICS AND
PERSONALIZED MEDICINE

2. OVERVIEW
What is pharmacogenomics?
-Processes involved
Challenges and controversies
Future of pharmacogenomics
Relationship to polypharmacy
FAQs about pharmacogenomics
Conclusions

3. INTRODUCTION
• Personalized medicine can be defined as a medical model that
uses an individual’s genetic profile or family history to guide
decisions made in regard to prevention, diagnosis, and
treatment of diseases.
• The term "personalized medicine" is often described as
providing "the right patient with the right drug at the right
dose at the right time.“

4. KEYWORDS
Genetics- The branch of biology that deals with heredity,
especially the mechanisms of hereditary transmission and the
variation of inherited traits among similar or related organisms.
Pharmacogenetics- The study of genetically determined
variations in responses to drugs in humans or in laboratory
organisms.
Pharmacogenomics- The formal study of inherited genetic
variations that dictate different drug responses. Pharmacogenomics
explores the ways such variations can be used to predict responses to
investigational products and plays an increasingly important role in
drug discovery.
Pharmacology- The science of drugs, including their
composition, uses, and effects.

5. CHALLENGES
• Interacting genetic and environmental factors that
may influence the response to a drug.
• Health services will have to adjust to new ways of
deciding the best drug to give to an individual.
• A lot of side effects might occur owing to the fact
that patients might not take their drugs as prescribed
by the doctor or the doctor prescribing the wrong
dose.

6. CONTROVERSIES
• Confidentiality: whether or
not the physician will keep
the genetic information
about their patient
confidential.
• Racial issues: whether and
how to integrate the
category of race into drug
development and marketing
especially in the USA.

7. FUTURE OF PHARMACOGENOMICS
 Note that pharmacogenomics can only enhance, but never
replace the need for proper clinical management. This has to
do with other non-genetic influences on drug functions.
 Currently, pharmacogenomics testing prior to drug use is
largely limited to chemotherapeutics. Selecting an optimal
drug for treatment can have a major impact on both cost &
prognosis, this makes the inconvenience and expense of testing
worthwhile.
 Increase in understanding of the multiple genetic influences
on drug action, combined with new technology may reduce
the testing cost.
 New technologies are improved to involve routine medical
assessment and the storage of the information for future use.
 Personalized medicine(PM)…

8. The promise of
personalized medicine:
Personalized medicine
can be used to predict a
person’s risk for a particular
disease.
Genome wide
association studies (GWAS)…
looks at the disease, sequences
patients’ genomes, finds out
shared mutation and keeps
record for future diagnosis.

9. RELATIONSHIP TO POLYPHARMACY
 Polypharmacy is the use of four (4) or more medications by a
patient, generally adults aged over 65 years.
 Polypharmacy leads to increased adverse drug reactions, drug
interactions, prescription cascade. It is often associated with a
decrease in quality of life, decreased mobility & cognition.
 Pharmacogenomics would play an important role in reducing
the occurrence of polypharmacy. With tailored drug
treatments, patients won’t have need for several medications
intended to treat the same conditions.
 Reduction in polypharmacy could potentially reduce the
occurrence of adverse drug reactions (ADRs).

10. FAQs
• What is the pharmacogenomics?
it’s a field of research, which studies how a
persons genetic make-up affects his response to medications.
• What is the AIM?
to help doctors select which drug is best suitable
for a patient.
• What role does gene play in how medications work?
just the same way our DNA determines our skin color, eye
color, our hair and all, its also partially responsible for how
we respond to medications.

11. How does pharmacogenomics affect drug design, development and
prescription.
Studying a drug only in the line of those that will benefit from the
drug ,could speed up the development time and also increase the
therapeutic benefit. The side effects of drugs could also be determined and
such drugs administered to patients who are not at risk of such side effects.
the FDA has included pharmacogenomics information on the
labels for more than 150 medications. This information include
• Dosage guidance
• Possible side effects
• Effectiveness for people with certain genomic
variation etc.

12. • How is pharmacogenomics information used today?
One current use of pharmacogenomics involves people infected with
the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Before prescribing the
antiviral drug abacavir (Ziagen), doctors now routinely test HIV-
infected patients for a genetic variant that makes them more likely to
have a bad reaction to the drug.
Another example is the breast cancer drug
trastuzumab (Herceptin). This therapy works only for women whose
tumors have a particular genetic profile,that leads to overproduction
of a protein called HER2.
• Can pharmacogenomics be used to produce new drugs?
Yes. Besides improving the ways in which existing drugs are
used, genome research will lead to the development of better
drugs. The goal is to produce new drugs that are highly effective
and do not cause serious side effects.

13. CONCLUSION
• Pharmacogenomics may also help to
save you time and money. By using
information about your genetic
makeup, doctors soon may be able to
avoid the trial-and-error approach of
giving you various drugs that are not
likely to work for you until they find
the right one. Using
pharmacogenomics, the "best-fit" drug
to help you can be chosen from the
beginning.
• Pharmacogenomics is a fast/rapid
growing area of research which we all
should embrace.

15. REFERENCES
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmacogenomics#Polypharmac
y
• http://www.nature.com/tpj/index.html
• http://www.futuremedicine.com/loi/pgs
• http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/handbook/genomicresearch/pharmacog
enomics
• http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/727112_9
• http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22231566
• http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/physician-
resources/medical-science/genetics-molecular-
medicine/current-topics/pharmacogenomics.page