PERSONALISED MEDICINE
OVER THE NEXT 10 TO 20 YEARS, PERSONALISED MEDICINES ARE EXPECTED TO ENTER MAINSTREAM HEALTHCARE. THE ROYAL PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY (RPS) RECENTLY HELD A SEMINAR ON THE IMPACT THAT PERSONALISED MEDICINE IS HAVING ON HEALTHCARE….
PERSONALISED MEDICINES AND THE PHARMACIST
By John Macgill
‘In terms of a definition personalised medicine,’ says Professor Gino Martini, ‘it is a diagnostic approach to identify a sub population of patients so they get the right medicine at the right time. That is my favoured definition because it reflects what is actually happening in clinical practice.’
Gino Martini is visiting professor in Pharmaceutical Innovation at King’s College London and Innovation and Outreach Lead for Roche in the UK. A member of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) Pharmaceutical Science Expert Advisory Group, he was one of the speakers at the recent RPS Scotland seminar at the Scottish
Alex Mackinnon tells delegates pharmacists have always practised personalised medicine
Parliament, addressing the impact that personalised medicine is having, and will have, on health, healthcare and resources.
Aberdeen University Professor of Primary Care Pharmacy, Christine Bond, chairs the RPS Pharmaceutical Science Expert Advisory Group. In common with other speakers, she acknowledged that personalised medicine is about both drugs and practice.
‘I think my definition is broad,’ she says. ‘It is about the very high-tech use of pharmacogenetics to see whether a patient is likely to respond or not, and making sure that the dose is right depending on their weight or age or condition. And it is about that person: thinking about their goals.
‘Often it is the pharmacist who has the opportunity to discuss what the patient wants. The pharmacist can also look with fresh eyes at what all they are taking. In terms of personalising things, while a doctor might keep adding drugs, pharmacists are conservative and question if they’re all needed and may start to de-prescribe – in a personalised way, with the patient in agreement and understanding what is happening.’
Independent prescriber at Edinburgh’s Barnton Pharmacy, Sally Arnison, says there is a central role for community pharmacists like her.
Sally Arnison: ‘…there is a central role for pharmacists like me.’ 26 - SCOTTISH PHARMACIST
‘You can have somebody on genetic therapy for a complex condition but how you personalise the rest of their care through community pharmacy is the bit that matters for me. If they are receiving therapy for breast cancer they are still going to get a cold and they are still going to come to you and need to get answers in terms of the
particular risks and benefits to them of any other care.’
RPS Director for Scotland, Alex MacKinnon, was pleased that the discussion at the Scottish Parliament was wide ranging, covering both drugs tuned to target genes and wider care. And, he says, in many respects pharmacists have always practised personalised medicine.
‘Thinking back to when I was a young pharmacist I used to make up cyanide antidote specifically for a person employed at a steel works because he used hydrogen cyanide to harden and purify the steel. And that antidote was tuned to his bodyweight, and so was a personalised medicine.’
Professor Martini says the role of pharmacy in personalised medicine is not being fully acknowledged.
‘We should keep talking about it and show how we are valuable mediators of healthcare. I see us playing an increasing, active role working with other professionals. So, for example, if a person is undergoing a chronic therapy, we can be actively monitoring how the medicine is working and how the disease is progressing, and feed this information on how well the patient is doing back to their doctor.’
‘Medicines are getting more complex and will continue to get more complex,’ says Sally Arnison. ‘But in the middle of this we have still got a patient, and that person may know very little about gene therapy or biotechnology. They are the person who has to take their medicines, and our job is to navigate the system for them and to make some of the decisions easier to take, and let them take the decisions that matter to them.’ •
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64
