Looking at Theranostics: What is Personalized Medicine?
Personalized medicine (also known as theranostics) is the latest, most promising frontier in medical science. It revolves around using genetic or other diagnostic tests to assess patients on an individual basis. Instead of prescribing the same drugs for millions of patients, healthcare organizations will be able to tailor medication and general therapeutic regimes for the needs of every patient — ensuring targeted treatments and better outcomes. What’s more, seeing as the USA currently spends around $9.500 per patient every year, it may also offer huge cost advantages for healthcare organizations.
How Does Personalized Medicine Work?
Properly individualized medicine has only become possible since advances in genome sequencing: the decoding of the genetic code which forms the basis of life. Recent innovations have allowed medical specialists to create individual genetic profiles, which can then be analyzed to discover abnormalities.
This is revolutionizing the way pediatricians diagnose children with genetic disorders. Asthma specialists are discovering ways to identify seniors who are susceptible to bronchial disorders before they develop, and personalized medicine is paving the way for early detection and treatments for neurological diseases such as Parkinson’s Disease or Alzheimer’s.
Finally, theranostics is helping oncologists understand which cancers will respond well to chemotherapy drugs. With that knowledge, we may be able to prescribe bespoke drugs for each tumor, attacking cancer at its most vulnerable spot.
Atheneum: Playing Our Part in Driving Forward Medical Progress with Theranostics
Theranostics is far from mainstream in the medical profession — something that Atheneum aims to rectify. Rolling out personalized medicine across all conditions and healthcare organizations requires significant investment, and that’s where our specialism lies. By investing in lower-cost genetic testing techniques, we can ensure that practitioners and researchers have the tools to diagnose all patients. Investments in drug development, data handling and analysis, clinical trials, IT technology, and research infrastructure are all important aspects of the challenge Given the potential benefits of theranostics across a host of conditions, it’s a challenge Atheneum is happy to accept.
