Tailored medicine is still a relatively new field. However, there is no doubt that it has the potential to bring enormous benefits to the world of healthcare. Traditionally, approaches to medical care have followed a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach, which has many drawbacks. While previous approaches to healthcare might be more attractive to authorities due to them being more streamlined and less costly on a large-scale, they are not suitable for all patients. Fortunately, the medical world is starting to acknowledge this and so personalised medical approaches are starting to emerge.
What is precision medicine?
Traditional medical approaches tend to treat patients with the same illnesses in the same way. However, whilst two people might have the same ailment, their individual reactions to the same illness, as well as their responses to the same treatment, could be completely different. Precision medicine aims to address this discrepancy, offering a personalised method of disease or symptom management that is unique to the individual.
Healthcare providers are able to tailor specific medical treatments based on numerous variables related to a patient and their condition. These include a wide variety of factors, such as the patient’s genetic makeup, what proteins are present in the body, the specific strain of a virus that’s in their system, their individual immune response, lifestyle habits – the list is endless. Identifying these different variables could involve the likes of diagnostic tests, using laboratory services such as Source BioScience, conducting patient questionnaires and more.
Where is precision medicine already used?
Although still in its early stages, tailored medicine has already been used by doctors in a number of conditions. Treatment for HIV, for instance, often uses the precision medicine model, as does treatment for certain cancers. With these conditions, it makes sense for healthcare providers to offer a more personalised approach.
Whilst there are two main types of HIV viruses that can infect humans, there are numerous sub-types. Moreover, once a person is infected with HIV, the virus can mutate into an individual strain – and this is before taking into account the variation in immune systems between individual patients. Different antiviral medicines can work against different HIV subtypes, although some virus strains are resistant to some of these drugs. That is why drug resistance testing, looking at different viral genes, is often carried out before starting on a particular treatment plan. Thanks to extensive scientific research and personalised medicine, treatment for HIV has come a long way and people who are managing the condition can now expect to live a long and healthy life.
When it comes to treating cancer, traditional approaches are often ineffective due to them not accounting for variation. There are more than 100 different types of cancers and again, all of which do not respond the same to the same treatments. As a result, healthcare providers are now starting to use targeted therapies to treat different types of cancer cells – for instance, the HER2-positive breast cancer cells. Precision medicines can also help with diagnosing cancer as it can be used to identify specific tumour markers.
Conclusion
Tailored treatments, such as precision medicine, are more effective than traditional approaches. While a more personalised approach has revolutionised some treatments, like HIV and cancer therapies, it still has a long way to go for it to benefit the wider population.