Personalized Medicine: Why 1% of your DNA can be the secret of better health

Personalized medicine examines the information of genomes to design individualized treatments.

To some extent, medicine has always been personal: doctors are examining how best to help the patient sitting in front of them.

However, technological advances make it possible to use the most unique properties ̵1; our genomes – to develop individualized treatments.

The genome is the complete set of genes that are contained in the chromosomes, the map of our DNA, and in some ways the guide to creating and maintaining the 37 billion cells that exist in our bodies.

Two people share more than 99% of their DNA. It is a little less than 1% which makes us unique and can affect the severity of a disease and the effectiveness of treatments.

Watching all these little differences can also help us to understand what the best way to treat a patient for a variety of diseases, from cancer and heart disease to depression.

Cancer detection tests
Your genome can help to establish specific treatments that are better for you.

For example, women with an increased risk of developing ovarian or breast cancers are identified by detecting changes in the genes BRCA1 or BRCA2 which protect the cancer prevent the formation of tumors.

Mutations in these genes increase the breast cancer risk in women four to eight times and may explain why some families have many members with this disease.

A BRCA1 mutation poses a life-long risk for a woman developing ovarian cancer of between 40 and 50%.

Some advances in this type of medicine concern the early detection of breast cancer.

The screening provided women with information about treatment and prevention options, such as when they wanted to have a mastectomy.
Are steps like these Patients in split even smaller groups identifying the best treatments – leading us to personalization.

The measurement of genetic activity is commonplace for certain cancers.
The genetic activity acts a bit like a light attenuator: can be set to low, high or an intermediate point. By measuring, we can see how active a given gene is in a tissue or a cell.

In breast cancer, a test that measures the activity of 50 genes in tumors can be used as a decision aid. The patient benefits from chemotherapy.

Personalized Medicine in Latin America
In Latin America, personalized tests are used Well below average in relation to the US or the European Union, but there have been some advances in recent years:

• Gustavo Bernard Esquivel in Mexico The Latin American Association for Personalized Medicine (ALAMP) “an effective, safe, standardized and economical way of patient care”.
• In May 2016, became the first clinic of personalized medicine, genomedics.
• In October 2016, the British IBM Watson Health signed the first personalized medicine agreement in Latin America, a cognitive computing system in Brazil.
• In July 2018 Roche Latin America acquired a subsidiary of the Swiss pharmaceutical company, operating in the region. “In many places in Latin America, diseases continue to be treated as they were 25 years ago,” said its director Daniel Ciriano.
• In August 2018, the Third International Symposium held Accuracy in Clinical Practice, which involved medical professionals in Latin America interested in personalized medicine.
• In January 2019, experts from Belgium, Chile, Germany, Mexico, Holland, Paraguay, Portugal, and Spain met to design a study. Cost-effective Algorithm to Detect Gastric Cancer whose advanced survival rate is only 12 months.

Beyond DNA
The development of these techniques raises the question: How far can “personalization” go?

In heart disease, diabetes and infectious diseases, the combination of genetics, lifestyle and experiences can also It plays an important role.

This means that information about small differences in DNA sequences alone is insufficient to predict susceptibility and outcomes.

However, the observation of genetic activity may also provide important guidance for improving the treatment of a patient.

A life-threatening disease in which these techniques may be helpful is the septicemia (also known as Sepsis.)

This is a serious condition in which the immune system damages one’s own organs while attempting to fight an infectio can be prescribed . However, these studies take some time and can not always identify the causative bacteria.