The Promise and Challenges of Implementing Pharmacogenomics to Improve Population Health: Where Are we Heading with Preemptive Pharmacogenomic Screening?

Individual variability in drug response efficacy or safety is becoming an increasing problem globally, given the growing population of older adults. Reasons for this variability include genomic factors, an area of study called pharmacogenomics. With genotyping technologies now widely available and decreasing in cost, implementing pharmacogenomics into clinical practice is widely viewed as an initial step in mainstreaming genomic medicine. The benefits of pharmacogenomic testing before starting drug therapy has been well documented for several single gene-drug combinations. In addition, the clinical utility of a pre-emptive genotyping strategy using a pharmacogenetic panel is being rigorously assessed. However, major challenges of implementation lie at the point of integration into healthcare systems, including the modification of clinical pathways and a large knowledge gap in pharmacogenomics in the healthcare workforce. Pharmacogenomics can also be used in a broader sense for drug discovery and development, with increasing evidence suggesting that genomically defined targets have an increased success rate during clinical development. Our speaker will review recent developments in the field of pharmacogenomics and the ongoing challenges in equitable translation of discoveries into clinical practice and public health programs.