Scientific study: "pharmacogenomics" is the beginning of a new era in medicine

A scientific study indicated that the currently available technology represents the beginning of a new era in medicine, which allows prescribing drugs that precisely match the genetic code of patients.

The British Pharmaceutical Society and the Royal College of Physicians say the genetic test offers the potential to predict how well drugs will work in the body.

The NHS may provide services to conduct these tests during the next year.

A person's genetic code or DNA is a guideline that shows how the body works, and the field of matching drugs to a person's DNA is known as pharmacogenomics.

sick conditions

If this science is proven to be effective, it will be possible to treat many cases, such as the British woman, Jane Burns, who lost two-thirds of her skin because her body reacted badly to a drug used to treat epilepsy. Doctors prescribed carbamazepine to her when she was nineteen years old. Her age, but she had a rash and her parents transferred her to the emergency department after two weeks when it was found that she had a severe hallucinatory fever and the appearance of the rash the next morning due to the epilepsy medication she used, which caused her to have Stevens-Johnson syndrome, which affects the skin, and people born with certain mutations in the skin suffer from it. their genetic code.

Jane supports pharmacogenomics testing, saying, "If it saves your life, great."

'Almost everyone is affected'

Gene's experience may seem rare, but Professor Mark Caulfield, president-elect of the British Pharmaceutical Society, says that "99.5% of us have at least one genome change, and if we happen to use the wrong drug, it either won't work, or does damage." .

And pharmacogenomics is already used in the manufacture of some drugs, as statistics indicate that 5 to 7 percent of people had, in the past, suffered from bad side effects towards the HIV drug “abacavir”, and some of them died, and DNA testing of people before Prescribing the drug means that there is currently no risk.

Provide the necessary technology

Scientists have studied nearly 100 drugs recommended by doctors in the UK, and their study concluded that we already have the technology to start genetic testing to guide the use of 40 of them.

The genetic test costs around £100 and can be done using a sample of blood or saliva.

And if the goal is currently to conduct a genetic examination when one of the forty drugs is prescribed, scientists aspire, in the long term, to conduct the examination early, perhaps at birth if the genetic examination continues for newborns, or as part of a routine examination when a person exceeds the age of fifty.

A new era in medicine

Professor Mounir Bermohamed, from the University of Liverpool, says: “We need to move away from a prescribing approach (one-dose, one-size-fits-all) and focus on a personalized approach, giving patients the right medication at the right dosage to improve drug efficacy and safety.”

"What we're doing is really transitioning into a new era in medicine, because we're all individuals, and we all have different responses to medications," he says.

With age, he says, more medications are prescribed to us, and there is a 70 percent chance that by the age of 70 you may have taken at least one drug that is affected by your genetic makeup.

Lord David Pryor, head of the British Health Services Authority, says: "This will revolutionize medicine," according to what was published on the BBC Arabic website.

He adds that pharmacogenomics "is the future" and "can now help us deliver a new, modern personalized healthcare system suitable for 2022."

Follow our latest local and sports news and the latest political and economic developments via Google news