Shalika White Julie McCollum Intro to Bio SCI 115 November 8, 2011
Imagine receiving a call from your child’s doctor to inform you that your baby’s genetic test results are in and they reveal that he or she has the markers of cancer and or heart disease! These test won’t reveal when or if your child would develop cancer but the percentage is great that he or she will. The doctor then tells you that he would like to begin a series of test and care, all personally developed and tailored just for your child in hopes of preventing him from developing cancer and heart disease. Would you be willing to begin this prevention? Would you even want to know this information?
Personalized medicine is the new revolution in medicine. “By offering the right treatment for the right individual, at the right time, personalized medicine can often prevent disease form developing, or reduce the severity of existing disease”. (www.dukepersonalizedmedicine.org) Scientist believe that if doctors were able to detect disease early on there would be less sickness, ultimately reducing medical cost and empowering overall health. Doctors will be able to work with each patient to promote health, wellness, patient education, disease prevention, detection and treatment. This particular strategy will differ from person to person and they would be able to understand individual risk factors. The benefits of personalized medicine would also include the reduction of overall healthcare, as well as reducing the risk of trial and error when diagnosing and treating patients. Often times a patient will go to the doctor rattling off a list of complaints and symptoms, in return the doctor has to order a series of test and make an educated guess as to what they feel maybe the cause of the patient’s distress. I would like to share a
