Chief Scientfic Officer at Coriell Life Sciences
Noteworthy: Chief Scientific Officer at Coriell Life Sciences, Jeff supports teams in making science comprehensible and scalable to healthcare systems, providers, and patients, addressing challenges of accessibility and cost.
Where to find him: LinkedIn
The Power of Pharmacogenomics
Jeff explains how pharmacogenomics, the study of how genes affect a person's response to medications, can revolutionize healthcare. By understanding a patient's genetic makeup, healthcare providers can prescribe the right medication and dosage, reducing trial and error, improving treatment effectiveness, and minimizing side effects. This approach acknowledges that each person is unique and recognizes the complex interplay of genetics and non-genetic factors to determine health outcomes.
Real-World Impact of Pharmacogenomics
Jeff provides real-world examples of how pharmacogenomics can impact medication management. He discusses the role of the medication Clopidogrel, used with patients who are receiving a stent. He explains how genetic variations can affect the response to this medication, highlighting the importance of pharmacogenomics in ensuring effective treatment.
The Future of Healthcare
Jeff discusses the future of healthcare, including the potential of wearable and implantable devices. He emphasizes the importance of giving healthcare professionals more tools to react in real-time and make informed decisions about patient care. He also discusses how companies like Coriell Life Sciences offer comprehensive medication management programs, highlighting the importance of scalability and accessibility in the adoption of pharmacogenomics.
Jeff introduces the concept of precision medicine and pharmacogenomics, explaining how these fields aim to improve healthcare outcomes by tailoring treatments to individual patient characteristics. He emphasizes that each person is unique and that both genetic and non-genetic factors play a role in determining health outcomes.
"Precision medicine is a field that really holds great promise for improving healthcare outcomes by tailoring medical treatments to the individual characteristics of each patient. It's an innovative approach to healthcare that takes into account individual variability in genes and environment and lifestyle factors when tailoring these medical treatments."
Jeff discusses the role of pharmacogenomics in personalized medicine, highlighting its potential to increase the efficacy and safety of medications. He explains how understanding a patient's genetic predispositions and molecular profiles can help healthcare professionals select the right therapy.
"Precision medicine enables healthcare providers to target specific disease mechanisms and their pathways, leading to more effective and personalized treatments. But by understanding that, um, an individual, a patient's genetic predispositions and their molecular profiles, those healthcare professionals can select the right therapy that's more likely to succeed and minimize those adverse reactions."
Jeff delves deeper into the impact of pharmacogenomics on medication management, providing examples of how genetic variations can affect the response to medications like Clopidogrel and statins. He emphasizes the importance of pharmacogenomics in ensuring effective treatment and improving patient outcomes.
"What happens is if you don't have, or if you've got a certain variant in your DNA, Clopidogrel doesn't work. Now that means it's not a headache or a belly ache or one of these side effects, but instead, it's a second cardiovascular event. It's a second heart attack or a second stroke. We absolutely want to avoid that. And the reason we're talking about pharmacogenomics is because we can avoid these bad outcomes."
Jeff discusses the future of precision medicine and pharmacogenomics, touching on the difference between reactive and proactive testing. He expresses his excitement about the future of healthcare, especially in terms of meeting patients closer to home and removing barriers through the use of genetic data, predictive analytics, and improved digital health platforms.
"If we're looking to the future of healthcare, I'm excited to see how we're going to continue to meet our patients closer to home. [...] Using genetic data together with predictive analytics and improved digital health platforms, I think we're gonna remove a lot of those barriers that have been a challenge in US healthcare for a long time."
Blog - Ready, set, genetic test: the time is now for PGx-enabled precision medicine
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